Wild Boy
by Shriayle
Summary: While on his way to an early morning training session, Tohjo Champion and Dragon Master Lance comes across a strange assortment of creatures, including a psychic Pokémon he doesn't recognize and a young child that seems just as untamed as his companions. [A combination of the games/anime, heavy AU.]
1. Lost, Found

**This might seem strange for those who have come here from my other dalliances into fanfiction, but my first fandom was Pokémon. I started, like so many others, with the anime dub, and then read the manga, and then my father got me a copy of Pokémon Crystal for my sixth birthday and I haven't looked back since. Most of my current interaction with the Pokémon franchise is through the games and I haven't quite had the time to go back to the anime, what with university and etc. life. Hopefully you all enjoy what I've spun and plan on for the future, despite all of the initial twists that I've decided to throw in right from the get-go. Please review so I know what you're enjoying (or not)!**

 **Some notes for this iteration:**

 **Ash is six years old at the beginning of this story. Minors are not allowed to be trainers unless they are accompanied by an appropriate guardian (non-minor) or considered emancipated. The traditional custom is to be emancipated at around twelve to thirteen in order to go on some sort of trainer's pilgrimage, whatever that means for the child in question. As this is the custom, most people are accustomed to having travelers of the age ask for lodging or help and are just as accustomed to giving such things.**

 **I'm not very good at cartoon writing and therefore have decided just to write this in a more serious/realistic tone rather than try and play in a genre that I don't feel comfortable in. This might turn the Pokémon universe into a harsher world; so be it.**

 **The League is just one of many organizations that work together to hold the regions together.**

 **Canon has been thrown out of the window for this completely. This includes captures and friends and enemies and characterizations and plot. I try my best, however, not to stray too far out of character for anyone.**

 **Ash is, for lack of a better word, feral at the beginning of this story. He might take a little while to break free of that. That being said, he is not just some OC that I've thrown Ash's name onto— I do strive to make him Ash-like whenever possible.**

 **I'm at heart a scientist and try my best to describe things like Pokémon scientifically. If I get ramble-y through one of the professors, you have my most sincere apologies for your boredom but not for writing it.**

 **Most human beings in this world speak slight variants on the same language, which is known as Universal.**

* * *

An explosion. People shouting. One man in particular glowering into the epicenter of a conflagration that swept unnaturally quickly throughout the facility. Once a pristine, perfect laboratory, whatever it was in the metaphorical eye of the storm was systematically destroying everything with a single thought and a roaring tongue of flame. Gone was their data, their studies, their findings. They wouldn't quite have to start from scratch; there were backups, logs, memories if they were desperate, but they had been set back by almost a decade by this methodical yet wanton destruction. It didn't help that those years of work were marked by their unnaturally quick progression—work that would have taken close to twenty years had been distilled into five, and now all of that was threatened by the very thing that they were studying.

The man snarled, refusing to back down even when his subordinates yelled and pulled desperately at his arms in an effort to convince him to run, too cowardly to yell at him but too emptily loyal to abandon him. He ran a hand through his short black hair—a nervous tic, one that the grunts around him knew would signal trouble. A beige feline creature stood at his side, ears slicked back in an expression of wounded pride and fury. The red gem on its forehead gleamed, flickering with some unseen power.

Within the flames, a small boy curled himself around a furry yellow creature whose cheeks sparked as it chattered angrily at the crowd of people on the other side of their fiery shield. A blue canid that would have come up to his waist were the boy standing was in position in front of him, red eyes narrowed and fists up, and in his arms lay a brown shelled creature that scuttled against his grip. A strange shimmering of physical data occasionally coalesced in front of the boy, throwing up a green hexagonal defense whenever the flames licked too close to the entourage. In front of them all was a purple feline creature, arms outstretched in a defensive position, who had thrown a transparent bubble around them all before grabbing the flames that the yellow creature had begun with nothing more than a spark and throwing them across the room. A smirk was slowly beginning to stretch across this final creature's face as he extended his wrist and marveled at how easily the fire obeyed its command.

All was going according to plan.

The man shouted at them. The boy didn't understand what the man was trying to say, but he did understand that the man was _anger-fire-loom_ and _sneak-hide-kind_ and that neither he nor his friends wanted to go with the man. The purple creature felt the boy's wave of energy wash over him and speak of _'worry-doubt-trust'_ and _'quick-time-gone'_ and understood that he couldn't revel in the destruction as he wanted to. With one final sweep of his hands, the purple creature turned back around and picked the boy up, snarling at their other companions to _"close-stay-linger time-leave-now"_.

The bubble disappeared. The man and the grunts surged forward. The cream-colored felid spat out star-shaped energy bolts straight towards where the purple figure huddled.

Just before they would have been hit with the stars, the strange gathering vanished.

Atop a craggy mountaintop, a man wrapped himself more firmly in his cape before continuing down the slope. The fierce breezes that naturally swept through the Tohjo Mountains and into Indigo Plateau felt brisker than normal, and Dragon Master Lance briefly understood why it was that the beasts whose respect he commanded were so easily quelled by a simple snowfall. Shivering, he held his hands in front of his mouth and let out a huff of a breath. He tried to catch as much of the warm air as he could, rubbing his hands together. In front of him scrabbled a small, long-necked creature that seemed to ignore the chill as she darted out in front of him. The creature pawed at the strange black scales that covered her eyes before shaking her entire body and moving to keep bounding forwards.

"Deino!" he called out. The small creature paused and turned back to him with a high-pitched snarl. "There's no hurry. We'll get to the training grounds soon enough."

Deino churred in response. Lance allowed himself a moment of frustration that he couldn't read the Pokémon's body language quite yet. This dragon had been a gift given by Dragon Master Drayden of Unova, and he had only just managed to convince the little dragon to trust him with her training. Now that the young dragon had met Lance's trio of Dragonites as well as his well-trained collection of other dragons, Deino was determined to join their ranks.

Lance just hoped that the enthusiasm that Deino showed wouldn't wane quite as much as he suspected that it would after they started training.

The small dragon made a cough-scoffing noise but paced in a tight circle to try and keep herself warm while Lance quickly walked over. The second that he caught up with her, Deino surged forward again, gleefully racing along the path. Lance just sighed and moved slightly more quickly to keep up with her.

Just before Deino truly entered the training grounds, she froze in place. Lance glanced over her [trembling legs, stock-still posture indicating her heightened alert state, the scales slowly beginning to bristle along her spine] and deftly unhooked a Pokéball from his belt. He didn't release the deadly monster in the ball yet, moving forward with the comfort of the metal sphere against his hand.

"This is League property!" he called in. "Anyone without the proper identification is trespassing and will be prosecuted as such. Show yourself!"

Deino growled at his side. He wasn't sure just how helpful she would be in her untrained state but he appreciated that she was trying.

There was no response. Lance looked back over at Deino, who seemed to be cautiously entering the space, sniffing around for signs of life. His eyes narrowed as she appeared to lock on to one specific corner of the training site that bordered on the natural forests of the Tohjo Mountains. He simply clicked the release button of the Pokéball.

Red light flooded the space as a behemoth of a creature was summoned from within the device. The light coalesced into a winged lizard that was partially hunched in on himself, foreclaws practically scraping the ground. Lance's Charizard was one of the largest of his kind, and his more potently draconic blood was more than observable in the burnished copper hue of his scales and the intense fury with which his tail flame burned a fierce red. Charizard seemed briefly uncertain of why Lance had released him before his pupils constricted into angry slits and his head whipped in the same direction as Deino had been facing before she squeaked and hid behind Lance's far less formidable form. Charizard growled, the deep rumble in the back of his throat echoing against the ground and into Lance's form.

"We know where you are! Reveal yourself!" Lance commanded, holding his shoulders stiffer still.

He heard some kind of snuffling before another Pokémon stuck its head out from behind a tree uncertainly. The Pikachu that slowly emerged— male, according to the shape of its tail— didn't seem surprised at the gathering of figures in the training grounds, choosing instead to hold firm despite standing on shaking legs. The Pikachu chattered a bit, the strange noises somehow mirroring the common species name. To Lance's surprise, Charizard gave a quiet snarl back and seemed to relax, standing up further on his hindlimbs to stand at his formidable ten-foot height and attempting to peer around the trees before having his attention drawn again by a suddenly more annoyed or angry set of noises from the Pikachu. Deino peeked around and gave an uncertain chirr before ducking away again when the Pikachu seemed to look over at her.

"I should get a translator for you guys," Lance said with a sigh. Charizard turned back to him and huffed in amusement, his mouth curling into a toothy smirk at his trainer's exasperated frustration.

In the moment of inattention, another Pokémon joined the Pikachu outside of the trees, this one a rather nervous looking Riolu. After softly barking at Pikachu, the Riolu ducked back into the trees.

"Look, you can't stay in those trees. It's dangerous in the mountains for creatures like you, and we train here, besides," Lance said. He moved to walk over to the trees only to be stopped by Pikachu's frantic squeaks and Charizard's warning growl.

Before Lance could ask either creature what was wrong, he saw the Riolu return, this time with more companions. One, a purple, humanoid Pokémon the height of a preteen child that Lance had never encountered before, was hovering in the air by a couple of inches and carrying another, a small, sickly looking boy wearing not much more than a tattered hospital gown. A quick glance had Lance estimating his age at around that of an academy student, and he seemed to be cradling some sort of round, rock-like object. Alarmed, Lance took a single step towards the strange gathering, Charizard's attempts at waylaying him ignored. The Riolu crouched into a defensive position in front of the unknown Pokémon and the boy, but Lance wasn't deterred by the gesture.

What did deter him, however, was the sudden loud ringing in his ears and the pressure that began to exert itself on the sides of his head. He cried out in surprise and pain and sank to his knees, pressing his palms against his temples. He could hear Charizard roar in anger, but it seemed worlds away until the pain stopped and he could hear a strange series of grunts. When he looked up, Lance saw the boy's hand on the unknown Pokémon's face in a strangely tender gesture, and he was making the noises, the animalistic sounds that the Pokémon seemed to be listening to. The boy's head turned towards Lance and Charizard and he made another set of sounds at them. Lance could see in Charizard's sudden shift in posture (stiff neck, foreclaws held up slightly, widened eyes) that he wasn't expecting the direct conversation, and it was with an uncertainty that the Charizard began to growl back, snorting and clicking as Lance had heard him do with Dragonite or Garchomp.

It was only when the boy seemed to respond to Charizard that Lance realized that his strange tongue was a rudimentary attempt at imitating Pokémon speech with the limited palate of the human mouth— rudimentary but successful. The boy also seemed to understand full well what Charizard was saying in kind.

As Lance contemplated what this could mean, the rounded object in the boy's arms suddenly twitched, and Lance started back when yellow claw-like appendages began to emerge and swipe towards him wildly. The boy paused his conversation with Charizard to coo at the strange creature, running a hand between two small openings in what Lance recognized now was a shell. It calmed from its sudden agitation, clicking against the boy's chest as it settled back down. The boy shivered from the temperature, breathing against his limbs in an attempt to warm himself up.

Deino butted Lance's leg with her head, a high-pitched whine echoing in the back of her throat. He couldn't tell if she wanted him to do something about the trespassers or just train. Lance knew that if it was the latter she would be severely disappointed.

"Charizard, please inform our guests that we mean no harm and that I will escort them back into the League building and away from this weather," he said. The large winged lizard snorted hot air into his trainer's face to warm him up before turning back to the gathering and growling what must have been an approximation of Lance's message. The boy's brow furrowed at Charizard's noises and he glanced at the purple Pokémon holding him. The creature's eyes narrowed at Lance, clearly distrustful. The Riolu and Pikachu huddled at the Pokémon's feet, obviously deferential.

The air seemed to shimmer slightly as a strangely amorphous being materialized in front of Lance's eyes, making him start back. Charizard snapped at it with his fangs, which seemed to give it some pause. The gathering of foreign Pokémon didn't seem shocked by its appearance, and the boy seemed to reach his hand out towards it, a measure of uncertainty and what could have been exasperation on his face. The being buzzed in Lance's ears, the unnatural screech sounding almost like the clicking of computer keys and the flipping of endless tiles. As abruptly as it appeared in front of him, the presence seemed to fade before turning into a flickering that came to life in front of the Riolu, who swiped at it, snarling quietly.

The purple Pokémon glared towards the interruption, cowing the strange heat-mirage-like figure to coalescing in the Riolu's arms. Lance wasn't sure whether it was proper for him to be amused by this interaction.

"We mean no harm," Lance repeated, uncertain how to assert his point and his lack of an agenda further. The Pokémon caught and held his gaze. He felt something begin to poke around his surface thoughts, searching for the hidden guilt that would expose him. Perhaps if Lance wasn't the man he was with the history or acquaintances that he had, he would be shocked by this, but the immediate migraine from earlier had prepared him for this eventuality.

He however wasn't prepared for the presence curling into his mind with sensations and thoughts foreign to his that spoke of _'no-betrayal-uncertain haze-on-mountain helpless-drifting-water help-help-help-help-help-help-help'_ until the final feelings of desperation began to overrule him. Lance merely fought to regain his conscious thought, closing his eyes to break eye contact. Charizard rumbled his concern quietly into Lance's ear, and he patted the winged lizard to let him know that he was okay.

"We can help you," Lance said firmly. The Pokémon looked at him. The boy seemed to have dozed off, the Pokémon he was cradling crawling further up his chest. The purple Pokémon looked down at the boy, an internal war clear in its expression, before it turned to Charizard and nodded. Charizard huffed at Lance and turned to start down the mountain path.

Deino whined again. Lance merely patted her head in apology before leading the entire strange party back to the League buildings, sending Deino ahead of him with a note that asked someone to clear a guest suite for the motley group. It was still early enough in the day for the main Headquarters to be mostly empty, but Lance could see the wandering figure of Bruno, the Fighting Master of Kanto, wandering through the hallways, trailed closely by a small bipedal bear. The Dragon Master nodded to his colleague, who merely raised an eyebrow at the oncoming entourage.

"Lance, may I ask what is happening here?" the burly man asked, crossing his arms. The Pancham following him mimicked the gesture and the furrow in his brow.

"What, no hello?" Lance quipped. Bruno seemed unamused. "I found this group concealing themselves in the few trees in the training grounds. They didn't seem like the type to truly be trespassing on League grounds, so I'm going to put them in a suite and let them rest before finding out why they were here."

Bruno looked over the group, expression turning curious when he saw the purple Pokémon, who was stiff with apprehension as it held the boy in its arms closer to its chest. The Pokémon noticed Bruno's interest in his cargo and curled around the boy, lips drawing upwards into a snarl. Bruno met the aggression with an impassive look before nodding to Lance and walking away silently. Pancham seemed more interested in the motley crew but loyally continued to tail the Master.

There were no further interactions until Lance found Deino sitting in front of the prepared suite and thanked her for her help. Deino chirped happily before standing on her hind legs and poking her Pokéball herself, transforming into red light that was quickly whisked away in the transportation unit. When Lance turned back to the entourage following him, he noticed that the Pikachu and Riolu were staring at the Pokéball with something akin to horror and the purple Pokémon staring at it with some look of grotesque interest. The boy wasn't looking at the Pokéball at all, choosing instead to stare directly at Lance.

This was the first time that Lance truly got a good look at the boy. He seemed malnourished but not starving, weak but from lack of movement rather than lack of nutrition. If he stood, he would perhaps be slightly shorter than average but not by a noticeable amount. His complexion seemed tanned despite its ill pallor, there were strange lightning-bolt-shaped birthmarks on his cheeks, and his hair was a long unruly black mop on his head. The way that he looked at Lance reminded the Dragon Master of a wild Pokémon judging a possible new trainer—wild and defiant yet open and cautiously interested. Lance merely bowed his head to the group, gesturing for them to enter the suite that had been cleared out by cleaning staff.

The purple Pokémon looked at Lance for a while, and he could feel it probing through his mind, trying to find any sign of guilt or double-crossing. When nothing emerged, the Pokémon uncertainly floated into the room, followed by its smaller companions.

Lance glanced in after them. It was a standard-sized League suite, which perhaps made it slightly more extravagant than the usual apartments. It consisted of a main room, a bed room, and a washroom, and it took the purple Pokémon little to no time to find the queen-sized bed and gently put down the boy in its arms. The other Pokémon began to find some freedom to clamber around the room. Lance merely stood by the suite's small kitchenette, watching the Riolu poke at the screen installed into the wall for communication and the Pikachu play with the blinds. The strange brown shape that the boy had been cradling scuttled across the floor suddenly like a strange version of the cleaning robots used by the staff. The strange being that accompanied the other Pokémon seemed to merge with the screen and the sharp features of a Porygon were visible on the other side. The Riolu barked at it while the Pikachu huffed in amusement, tail twitching.

That made Lance blink. He mused on how to acquire a Porygon adaptor without anyone on IT questioning why he would need it so that he could grant the being a physical body of its own.

He shook that thought out of his head. "I will be in my office," he announced to the room at large. "I assume you would like to rest. If you are in need of anything at all, please don't hesitate to find me." With one final nod, Lance turned and left the suite, feeling it automatically lock behind him.

"Well, well, Lance, you don't do things by halves, do you."

Lance started upon hearing the voice at his right but quickly regained his composure when he registered who it was that was talking to him. "I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about, Madam Agatha," he said, looking over his shoulder to see the aged lady standing in the hall. He eyed her intricate ebony cane, knowing full well that the Ghost Master didn't truly need it to walk and merely used it as a vessel for a being far more powerful than he could hope to command. Her shadow quivered in the steady light, and the very air around her felt chilling.

Agatha snorted. "Please, I think I've lived long enough to tear that title to shreds," she said. Her shadow blinked at Lance, a multi-eyed sea of unfathomable depths. "What I mean, foolish boy, is that you've brought a feral child into the heart of the League itself with no knowledge of where he comes from. The League is no place for a child to live, much less a wild one."

"I can care for the child, Agatha," Lance said impatiently.

"Can you?" she shot back. "You're preparing to take on the mantle of Tohjo Champion, representing not just your native Johto but the Kanto region as well. You've been struggling to find time to yourself to simply interact with your Pokémon team—you went to train this morning and couldn't even do that. How is that Deino of yours going to grow when you can barely take care of her?" She tapped the floor with her cane, and her substantial shadow began to wind up it in a swirling mass. "You had a luxury in training to claim current Master status over Scorpia in that the challenges of being Master weren't forced upon you. Now you have those additional charges. Do you know how you're going to balance all of that, child or no? This is no place or time to have a soft heart, Lance of Blackthorn."

Lance grimaced at Agatha's words, knowing both that she was correct and that he was confident that he could prove her wrong. Agatha recognized the gleam in his eyes and gave a dry cackle.

"Listen boy," she said, reaching a hand out to pat the substantial shadow lovingly, "this may be a trial that you will only understand once you've failed at it. Despite how it sounds, I am not trying to stop you, merely giving you a warning. It does not do to linger in overconfidence and dreams. As soon as this whole operation starts going south, just pull the plug on it and call in someone more prepared."

Lance bristled at the implied criticism that he wasn't competent enough for this task but couldn't respond before Agatha turned and began walking back down the hallway that she came from. Her shadow emerged slightly, lingering in the bipedal, spiky shape of one of her Gengar that stared back at Lance for a bit before bursting into a too-wide grin, giving an unearthly howl of a laugh, and merging with her presence once more.

The door behind Lance opened, and he turned to see the strange purple Pokémon, who had opened the door just enough to peek out from behind. There was curiosity and a slight haze of fear in its gaze. Lance could tell that the Pokémon had heard practically everything that he and Agatha had said to each other.

"I won't abandon you just because she thinks I should," Lance said, hoping that his words got across to the strange creature.

It said nothing in response, merely taking in Lance's entire form, glancing up and down as if trying to memorize it.

"Please, believe me."

Silence.

Lance looked to the ground, frustrated in his lack of ability to communicate with the Pokémon. He decided to make one final attempt before retiring to his office to catch up on whatever paperwork he had to complete. If he was going to have the boy and his Pokémon companions under his care, he might as well make it official.

"Can I at least get yours and the boy's name?" Lance asked. "We need to get you both registered as my dependents for as long as you are here."

The Pokémon looked at him, seemingly startled at the frank way he was asking the question. The mind prodding felt sensationless in its initial form, searching for any ulterior motives yet again. Lance briefly wondered what happened to the Pokémon for it to be so untrusting of him. The Pokémon's brow furrowed at the sympathy and compassion of the concern, eyes darting back to Lance's face to try and find some outer sign of falsehood.

Lance felt an uncertain foreign presence in his surface thoughts. ' _Son-of-Mew he-of-mew two-of-Mew two-of-Mew, Mew-two Mew-two Mew-two'_ began to repeat on loop.

"Mewtwo?" Lance repeated. The Pokémon hesitantly nodded, pointing at himself as he did so.

"And the boy?" Lance asked softly.

Mewtwo seemed a little more reluctant, but Lance felt him poke into his mind again. _'Dying-final-fire,'_ Mewtwo said first, _'final-fire-remnant, last-fire, fire-death-remnant, soot-grey-wood, fire-to-ash, ash-ash-ash-ash-ash-ash—'_

"Ash?" Lance said, cutting Mewtwo's line of thought off once it settled on one central idea.

Mewtwo nodded again.

"Thank you, Mewtwo," Lance said, giving the Pokémon a shallow bow. Mewtwo seemed surprised by this courtesy and mirrored it as best as he could. Lance just smiled slightly before leaving for his office, allowing Mewtwo to watch him disappear into the hallway.

Perhaps Agatha had one thing correct: there were other people that he was going to have to reach out to in order to comfort the newcomers and help them adapt to the civilized life that they would need to at least pretend to live if they were going to stay in the League.

It took another couple of weeks before Lance saw Ash or Mewtwo again. He was told by housekeeping that none of that strange group had ever been seen leaving the suite and that they did not dare set foot in after a maid opened the door, surprising the Pikachu enough to wildly blast a bolt of electricity towards her. Suffice it to say, the staff was more than happy to just leave meals for the group outside of the door and pick up the used dishes afterwards. They had spoken of how the silverware was left neatly untouched while the plates seemed to be licked clean, perhaps as a snide comment for Lance to correct his new charge's manners, but the man simply didn't have time to check in on the boy. Agatha's words echoed in Lance's head, but he just irritably shook them off.

Deino stood by his side again. She stood a little bit taller, her enthusiasm not dampened at all but her draconic pride forcing her to stand at his side as her own charge.

It never failed to amuse Lance how quickly his dragons became his guard dogs and self-assigned caretakers.

He knocked quietly on the door of the suite, shuffling the parcel under his arms a bit to make sure it didn't slip out. He felt a wave of _something_ wash over him, probing his mind. While he hadn't undergone this in a fortnight, he knew exactly what (or who) it was.

"Mewtwo, it's me, Lance. I need to speak with you about something." The wave paused before retreating, and the door in front of Lance opened a crack. After waiting what he felt was a prudent amount of time, Lance carefully pushed the door open a little bit further.

The suite was less of a mess than he assumed it would be after a fortnight of destruction. The sheets of the bed had been yanked off and thrown into a pile in the corner with the pillows, leaving nothing but a plain mattress. Lance was mildly surprised to find that the boy (and Pokémon) apparently knew something about indoor plumbing because they had all apparently washed off all of the grime that he remembered coating them at some point in the past few days. Ash was even wearing the simple t-shirt and shorts that he had requested to be delivered. The boy was curled up with the strange brown Pokémon that Lance now recognized as a Kabuto in his lap, with Pikachu and Riolu snuggled up to him on either side. Porygon was once again on the monitor screen. Mewtwo was staring straight at Lance from his place by the others, though his body language still read as relaxed rather than at attention like it might have been just two weeks prior. Lance wondered how quickly it took Mewtwo to realize that he could be trusted.

Lance quickly looked away, trying to make his tall figure seem less imposing. He decided to just sit on the ground farther away, letting his package fall ungracefully to the ground beside him. Deino walked up behind him and began to calmly start chewing on his hair. He made a few halfhearted attempts to shake her off before relenting and allowing the little dragon to gnaw at will.

"I'm sorry for disturbing you all," Lance said softly.

All of the inhabitants of the room looked at him with similar cautious but relaxed expressions.

"I wanted to bring you a few things that will help avoid questions in the future." Lance undid the parcel he brought with him and first took out a couple of apples and miscellaneous berries. "But first, I thought you might want something more natural than the food provided for us."

Mewtwo's eyes glowed a brief moment before the fruit flew over towards the collection of Pokémon and boy, all of whom grabbed at it and began to tear into it. Lance watched the ravenous feast with some level of awe. Never before had he seen a human eat an entire apple, core, stem, and all.

"I'll, uh, try and bring some around more often then," he said, trying not to burst out laughing at how the boy and Pikachu filled their cheeks.

' _Happy-lots-grateful'_ ran through his head. Lance nodded to Mewtwo in acknowledgement.

"These are the more boring bits," Lance said, taking out a few papers. "These are the emancipation documents. They'll allow you to legally travel wherever you want in registered League regions—so Kanto, Johto, Hoenn, Sinnoh, Unova, Kalos, and perhaps Alola if negotiations go well. All that should mean for you is that you can go wherever you please without anyone bothering you or trying to bring you back anywhere, even if you're registered as dependents under my name until you—Ash—comes of age. I'll need a signature from Ash to file these away properly."

Ash looked startled that Lance knew his name and shot Mewtwo a dirty look when the purple Pokémon looked away innocently. Lance could practically hear the felid whistling his guiltlessness.

Lance merely held out the papers along with a pen. "I just need you to put some marking on the three lines with x's next to them," he said as encouragingly as he could manage."

Ash awkwardly crawled over and reached out to take the papers from Lance. Rather than just scribbling by the lines that Lance had marked, he seemed to be taking his time scrutinizing the print on the sheets. Mewtwo had now turned to peer over Ash's shoulder and was equally engrossed, and Pikachu and Riolu seemed to be equally curious but in a much emptier way.

When Ash finally lifted the pen, scribbled on the paper, and handed them back to Lance, the man was thunderstruck to find that Ash had managed to scrawl his name somewhat legibly on the sheets. He looked up at the boy, who seemed more worried now.

"Can you understand Universal, Ash?" he asked softly.

The boy looked away briefly before looking back and reluctantly nodding.

"Well, that makes my life slightly easier," Lance said, deciding not to delve too deeply into that. He put the papers down and picked up a red device, flipping it open. "This is a machine derived from something called a Pokémon Index, or a Pokédex for short, and a cross-transceiver. It can be used both to look up any necessary information and communicate to anyone within a rather large radius, though you can power each half down to strengthen the other half. They also double as identification for Trainers. It's standard to issue one of these to any new Trainer in the field, and they can upgrade them to suit their adventuring style with apps you can download or physical cards that can be installed. It's all up to you how you choose to customize it." He handed the machine to Ash, who took it and started poking buttons on it.

It was a strange circular machine that had two panels that opened on the top and bottom, with panels that extended horizontally. A screen booted up on the middle panel and the top two projected to form a small three-dimensional model of light. Ash seemed mesmerized by this before blinking out of his self-imposed hypnosis and hurriedly closing the machine.

Lance took his own out of his pocket. "May I demonstrate how this works?" he asked. At Ash's nod (mirrored by Mewtwo), Lance deftly opened up his own and pointed the bottom of the middle panel at Deino for a split second before flicking it to its horizontal position again. The projector booted up its stock image of a Deino, complete with small message boxes that described the Pokémon's physiology with helpful lines drawing to different parts.

"As you can see, you can learn a lot about a Pokémon you meet solely from this, as well as access a list of notes that have already been observed worldwide by trainers and researchers alike." Ash stared at the more battered version of the machine in Lance's hands before looking at the one in his. He gingerly opened the panels up and waited for the screen to boot up. When it did, he gave a quiet cry before turning expectantly to the others. Pikachu's ears twitched before he ran up curiously to Ash. The boy awkwardly angled the bottom of the device towards the yellow Pokémon, activating the camera installed there. Pikachu's model was projected over the top of the middle panel, with notes on the general species as well as the particular specimen. Pikachu chirped, leaping onto Ash's shoulder to peer at the model. He ran his paw through the model, chattering when the projection blinked unstably.

Lance felt a nudge at his side. Riolu had walked up to him and was staring curiously at his own Pokédex.

"Do you want me to scan you?" he asked.

The Pokémon nodded, obviously intrigued.

Lance scanned Riolu in, crouching down to keep himself as non-threatening as possible. "See, this data—" _[[Riolu, the Emanation Pokémon. It uses the shapes of auras, which change according to emotion, to communicate with others—]]_ "—is more universal. All Riolu will trigger this message. What is more personal for you—" _[[This Riolu is female and most likely of the Lonely nature. Probable level- 15. Moves known- Foresight, Quick Attack, Endure, Counter, Feint, Force Palm, Meteor Mash, Aura Sphere.]]_ "—huh?"

Lance looked to his Pokédex blinking at the last move listed. He numbly wondered if the Pokédex had somehow glitched out.

The Riolu quietly barked at him, tipping her head sideways when he looked over to her.

"Most research states that Riolu can't learn Aura Sphere," Lance explained. "There's never been any evidence of it."

"Aura?" Lance froze at the rusty voice that croaked at him. Ash was looking over at him intently, Pikachu staring at Lance as well. Mewtwo was still; had Lance not been able to see his eyes darting back and forth, he would have thought Mewtwo was immobilized by something.

When Lance didn't respond, Ash spoke again. "Amber can use aura. Can't everyone?"

Lance blinked. "Ah—no, not from what I know. The last recorded human who used aura was centuries ago and perished trying to harness it for good. It's been illegal to practice aura or experiment with it since the League's inception."

"League?" Lance could have kicked himself for forgetting that Ash probably had little to no knowledge of politics.

"Never mind that, I'll teach you about it later. What did you mean, everyone can use aura?"

Ash glanced over to Mewtwo; the Kabuto had crawled back into Ash's lap like some sort of strange pet. Mewtwo just nodded to Ash (Lance took a moment to preen at the way Mewtwo seemed to trust him now).

The boy lifted his hand, palm up and towards Lance. Before the man's disbelieving eyes, bluish light seemed to coalesce and swirl into a small sphere of energy that gathered above his palm.

As soon as the aura had built up substantially, Ash turned, standing up in the process and sending Kabuto scuttling to the floor in a panic. With a practiced flick of the wrist, he sent the blob of aura flying towards Mewtwo.

"What are you—" Lance was cut off by a sharp sizzling sound as the aura hit and dissipated against Mewtwo's psychic barrier, a bubble-like creation which then flickered out of existence with the Pokémon's hand lowering. A moment of silence passed in the room.

"…huh. Okay. I'm not going to say anything about this," Lance decided. Mewtwo's shoulders sagged slightly in relief.

"Now that the excitement's over, it's time to get back to the paperwork. First, here's a gift from me, unrelated to any of this business." He showed Ash the strange crystalline prism filled with inlaid wires and other kinds of circuitry. "This is informally referred to as a Porygon adaptor. Your friend should be able to manifest in a more physical form with this. I can show you how to install it in a bit, but do you think it wants to try?"

Ash took the prism from Lance's palm, his eyes wide. He turned towards the occupied screen in the room and gave a wordless croon, holding the crystal out. The angular figure on the screen flickered out of existence and the strange aberration on the air (Lance now recognized that it was manipulating the ambient light in the space with its strange incorporeal form) fluidly darted across and into the crystal. The angular pink and blue bird-like creature from the screen soon flickered into existence in front of Ash, giving a staticky chirp of happiness as it whizzed around him.

Lance showed Ash where on the Pokédex he could install the Porygon projector (a small panel revealed a place to slot it in) before bracing himself for the next conversation.

"Ash, you're not going to like what I have to say next, most likely," he started hesitantly. "If my suspicions are correct, the Pokémon that are with you aren't registered to anyone and technically considered 'wild.' That means that under the laws of the League, anyone can simply walk up and choose to attempt to capture them, and if they succeed, then the Pokémon is considered under their ownership."

Mewtwo's hackles rose and his eyes narrowed. The Pokémon seemed to know where Lance was getting at and didn't like it at all. Still, Lance soldiered on.

"In order to register the Pokémon such that no one can take them from you, you'll have to capture them yourself using these." Lance brought out a handful of Pokéballs. Ash's eyes widened as he stared at them. Lance was almost surprised by the vehement hatred that he glared at the devices with; such a dark feeling didn't seem right on this young boy's face.

"They don't have to stay in there," Lance quickly clarified. "They merely have to be caught and then they can be released again—there's no law stating otherwise, and a lot of Trainers like having their companions with them when traveling through the regions. Pokéballs—these things—have their own uses as well. When a Pokémon is put in one, they're put into a state of stasis that slows down any injury that they've sustained so that they can get medical treatment much more quickly. Some kinds of Pokéballs have a calming property encoded into them such to calm any agitation. They come in different strengths, but they all react only to the elemental energy given off by Pokémon, so it's not like you'll find a Pokéball somewhere with a human inside. Does all of that make sense?"

"Bad people are in Pokéballs," Ash muttered.

"How do you mean, Ash?" Lance asked gently, putting the shrunken Pokéballs onto the ground to try and make himself less threatening still.

"Whenever they didn't like what we did, they would come out of Pokéballs and hurt us. They were bad to us," Ash said.

Lance felt Mewtwo enter his mind again— _'pain-last-poison ground-shake-fear stab-strike-bleed bleed-bleed-tear mind-scream-stop stop-never-pain'_ ran through Lance's head, images of towering, snarling, slavering beasts slashing the air by his face, a single second of intense agony in his upper arm that immediately was dulled down to a quiet but constant ache that faded when the thoughts shifted to a different sensation of a more shattering, widespread pain. He gritted his teeth but endured the onslaught, trying to understand what the two of them together were imparting. Pikachu and Riolu chattered as well, and though their words made no sense to Lance, he could hear the fervent emotion that they spoke with.

"I assure you," Lance said, "that no Pokémon enters a Pokéball good and comes out bad. They aren't corrupting tools; they're meant more for registration and convenience. Perhaps some engineer somewhere has created a device that's meant to make Pokémon evil, but these won't do that."

Ash continued to glare at the Pokéballs on the ground.

To Lance's surprise, Deino chirped at them. She had stopped messing with his hair in favor of laying her head in his lap a while before, but now she stood up and cautiously walked towards the wild boy and his Pokémon friends. Pikachu and Riolu were staring at her as though she had grown her second head already, but Mewtwo seemed intrigued by what she was saying. Deino seized up suddenly before turning to him, shivering slightly out of nervousness, but she continued to call out to them, perhaps defending Lance, perhaps telling them of her own experience with the technology. At some point, Deino turned to Lance and churred at him, leaning down to nudge Lance's hand towards his belt when he didn't seem to understand what she was saying. Lance detached Deino's Pokéball and held it in his palm towards her. Rather than tapping the button as he expected her to, Deino reached over and picked the ball up in her mouth, walking over to the strange group. She carefully put it on the ground before giving another set of cries, an impassioned speech.

Pikachu continued to look unimpressed, while Riolu seemed slightly more interested in what Deino was saying.

Deino finally looked around at her audience before just quietly chirping one last time and nudging the button on the Pokéball. Deino's form flickered into red light that was swept into the device, which shut with a clean snap before rolling over slightly.

Kabuto scuttled over and poked at the sphere. Before Ash could get to Kabuto and scoop the Pokémon up, it poked at the button, sending Deino back out with a futuristic whoosh. Deino shook her head to clear it from being sent out of stasis so quickly, and Lance quickly cut in and called her over before more Pokéball experimentation could be done. Ash watched the dragon obediently run over to him and nudge his leg for attention as if waiting for her to suddenly turn feral and bite through half of his leg.

(He wouldn't have been surprised if that was what Ash was expecting.)

"I won't force you to use these," Lance said. "I'll leave them with you, and you can choose whether or not you want to use them. They've already been registered to that Pokédex, which is connected to you. Any Pokémon caught in them will be legally yours. It's your decision what to do with them now.

"Well, that's everything I had for you. I'll get you in the system as an emancipated minor, and we can see what you want to do from there. I'll ask the cleaning staff to change your diet a bit to fit what you used to eat. See you later, Ash."

Lance left the boy staring at the collection of spherical capsules, Mewtwo staring after him.


	2. Childhood

**Thank you for all of the interest in this story! I can't say that I expected this to happen. As I was writing this chapter, I became starkly aware of how many times I capitalized words; as such, from here on, I won't be capitalizing the word pokémon to both make it a bit easier on the eyes and help me write more quickly. Due to chapter lengths and college classes, I can't guarantee swift updates, but I hope you're willing to stick with me through this story, as I do have quite a few plans for it still in store.**

* * *

"Lance, there's someone here to see you."

The Dragon Master looked up blearily from the scattered sheets of paper on his desk, absentmindedly restacking the pile right in front of him. The attendant standing at his door seemed impassive as ever, ignoring both Lance's rather bedraggled appearance in her formality and the glaring set of dragons who kept an eye on anyone who intruded on their territory. Haxorus specifically growled under his breath, which Lance quieted with a quick tongue click.

Lance cleared his throat, dusted out the folds in his shirt, and ran a hand through his hair. He wondered briefly who was visiting him before remembering the one appointment he had arranged in the past few days.

"Right, let him in, thank you," he said. The attendant gave him a short bow before ducking out of the doorway. A couple of seconds later, the door swung open far more widely in a grand gesture. Lance just chuckled to himself and rolled his eyes, allowing himself to lean back and relax in his chair. He briefly wondered if he should have asked the attendant for a bottle of wine or something to share with his visitor.

"Lance of Blackthorn! Don't hide from me behind that desk of yours," the man who strode in said loudly. A clay-colored pokémon accompanied him, glancing about with flashing green eyes as it scanned the room for any danger for its trainer, locking onto the dragons present for a split second before dismissing them. Lance smiled before wearily standing up and walking around his desk as his guest requested.

"I'd never thought I would ever end up cashing that favor in with you, Scott, but desperate times, I'm afraid. Did you have a safe trip?"

The man absentmindedly scratched his head, adjusting the shades he wore while doing so. "I asked Beheeyem here to Teleport me as fast as she could, and I have never been disappointed by her skills. And desperate times? I thought the League was thriving, not just surviving," Scott said. Lance heard the question underneath his lighthearted humor and began to bristle at even the possibility that the League was more unstable than it appeared.

"Rest assured, we as the League don't need the Frontier as of right now." Lance crossed his arms in front of his chest as he leaned back against his desk. "This is a favor from me as a man to you as a man, not from Champion to Frontier Head."

"Frontier Head? I guess that's appropriate, seeing as I house and protect my Brains," Scott quipped. Beheeyem rumbled her support.

"I'm just going to cut to the chase, Scott. I saw that you gained ownership of a ward once. A girl—Anabel, was it?"

The atmosphere in the room immediately shifted. Scott dropped his cheerful persona and Lance was reminded of the man who had thoroughly trounced the Indigo League and gracefully bowed out of the Elite Challenge, choosing instead to try and restore the old thrill of battling in Kanto. Scott had been dangerous, appearing out of thin air with pokémon so fiercely loyal that he was nearly disqualified due to his Swampert's indignant rage. He had inspired an entire generation of trainers to become one with their pokémon, to breathe with them and run beside them even if they couldn't battle alongside them on the field. Scott had been legendary in his time. Now, almost no one made the true connection between Scott of Verdanturf, one-time Indigo Champion, and Scott of the Battle Frontier.

"It would be foolish of me to deny it, Lance, seeing as you seem to have torn through almost a year's worth of paperwork," Scott responded mildly, gesturing to Lance's desk. He peered over his shades at Lance. "Though, I must confess, I'm rather curious as to why you brought this up? I took Anabel in quite some time ago, when she was practically still a toddler."

Lance began to clean the fingernails of one hand with those of the other. There was a chip in his left index fingernail—perhaps he'd need a file for that. "It just so happens that I find myself now in the same position as you did then."

The silence in the room bloated until both men felt the pressure on their chests, but neither wanted to be the first to break. The only sound was the quiet hum of Beheeyem's form vibrating in the air.

"Fine, I'll bite. What the hell? Since when did you want kids?"

Lance smirked at Scott's words. "Believe me, it wasn't at all intentional," he said somewhat defensively.

Scott snorted. "I don't think it's possible to unintentionally adopt a child," he pointed out.

"A fair statement, but let me explain a bit. I found the boy with an entire posse of pokémon in a forest on the Tohjo range while intending to train my newest addition." Deino perked up from the pile of dragons in the corner and ambled over to find out why she was being talked about. Lance smiled at her slightly and patted her head to satisfy her craving for attention. "I have no idea how he got there or even if he is legally someone's son. However, I had to get him registered with the government's databases somehow, and the best way to do so was as my ward. He has full League protection under my name and is free to act as much or as little like any other child does now, and I find myself having to take care of him while also running this branch of the League. Surely if you've done it, you have some idea of what you're doing."

"Believe me, Lance, if you know what you're doing as a guardian to some kid, you'll become a millionaire by teaching parents how not to fuck up their kid." Scott sighed before sitting down on an invisible barrier. Lance couldn't help glancing over to Beheeyem, who looked back at him impassively even as her eyes glowed blue with the effort of holding Scott up. Scott himself seemed to be thinking hard about something—he took off his shades and mindlessly began to polish them with the hem of his bright blue shirt, not noticing when he lingered for seconds too long on one lens over the other.

"I'm guessing that it would be a bad idea for me to meet him," Scott finally said.

"I don't know how he'd react to a stranger," Lance responded as neutrally as he could.

Scott hummed. "Anabel was easily spooked for a good amount of time when I first gained guardianship over her. She's still a bit reserved, if I'm to be completely honest. Her nifty little gift doesn't exactly help either; she withdraws into her pokémon if at all possible, which isn't great for, y'know, teaching her human interaction."

Lance froze at that detail. "Is she good with pokémon?" he asked, trying to sound casual. From the look on Scott's face, he did a very bad job of it.

"She's excellent with them. She must have some mild empathetic ability or something. She's able to communicate and bond with pokémon so easily, it's as if she can read their minds. It's the reason why she ended up my ward, actually. Some goons tried to kidnap her to force her to use her powers for their own cause, but after leaving her an orphan they suddenly lost all interest in her. Strange, really."

"Would you mind bringing her next time? She might be more successful talking to Ash than any of us."

Scott furrowed his brow. "Again, she's much better with pokémon than with other humans," he reminded Lance.

"It's a good thing that Ash is more pokémon than human then," Lance commented.

* * *

Scott had left a little bit after he and Lance arranged a day to introduce Anabel to Ash (Lance had taken a mental second to laugh at the idea that he was setting Ash up for some kind of play-date, as though he were a completely normal child with playmates and poignantly potent innocence). After Scott's departure via Beheeyem, Lance had made sure all of his paperwork was taken care of and walked down the hallway to visit Ash again.

It had been a few days since he had last visited the room. The maids that left the motley crew their food had begun to mix in fresh fruits and berries at Lance's request and marveled at the pristine condition that plates were left in after food was delivered. They had taken this as a sign that the boy and his companions were beginning to relax and to trust in the League as benevolent and trustworthy.

Lance was fairly certain that it was a sign that Ash was a hungry boy and his companions hungry pokémon.

Lance knocked on the door. He felt a passing psychic presence in his head that faded almost immediately upon recognizing him, followed immediately by the door opening just a crack in front of him in invitation. Lance poked the door open slightly more and stuck his head in.

The room was slightly neater than it had been before. The Pokéballs still lay in the middle of the floor, and Lance found himself disappointed by this though he hadn't expected anything different. Ash himself was lying on his back, eyes closed, while Pikachu and Riolu had at some point climbed on top of him as though he were a bench and were chattering at Mewtwo from their perch. Lance didn't hear Mewtwo respond verbally, though perhaps with powers as strong as he did, he wouldn't need to communicate out loud. Kabuto was, confusingly enough, crawling across the ceiling, and Porygon was floating through the air aimlessly, apparently still not over the novelty of having an actual body.

"Hello there," Lance said somewhat awkwardly. Surprisingly, there was no immediate difference. Pikachu, Riolu, and Mewtwo looked over to him with neutral but open expressions. Porygon paused by Ash's head before expectantly looking to Lance. Kabuto continued to happily scuttle along the ceiling until he was right above Lance and then casually let go, forcing the Champion to catch him. Lance fumbled a little bit with Kabuto; the pokémon was nowhere near as nervous as some of the Sinnoh League's revitalized fossils and was also as heavy as a rock his size. He heard the room's other inhabitants huff in amusement at his predicament.

"What, no help?" Lance asked, readjusting his arms to cradle Kabuto slightly better. It occurred to him seconds later that he wasn't sure if Ash knew what teasing sounded like, but his fears proved to be unfounded when the boy simply gave him an impish look.

"Fossil isn't harmful," Ash said, almost reassuringly.

"Fossil?" Lance asked.

Ash just pointed at the happily flailing pokémon in Lance's arms. "Fossil! Project FOSSIL—a failure in complete DNA repair, but a success in recreating natural life. He was patched up with Cradily DNA, which left lasting side effects!"

Lance blinked at the words so obviously parroted to him. "Can you say that one more time, Ash?" he asked, feeling Kabuto (Fossil?) wave his leg-like appendages at him. Lance quickly took out his Pokédex to scan the pokémon in quickly. Ash shrugged before repeating his words almost verbatim, as though parroting them from a well-known script.

The machine's cool, mechanical voice booted up quickly. Lance impatiently waited for the basic information to read out ( _[[Kabuto, the Shellfish Pokémon. A pokémon that was recovered from a fossil. It used the eyes on its back while hiding on the seafloor—]]_ ) and paid as close attention to the specific information as he could to see if it would help him glean a better understanding of Ash's words: _[[This Kabuto is male and most likely of the Relaxed nature. Probable level- 12. Moves known- Scratch, Harden, Absorb, Leer, Confuse Ray, Giga Drain, Stealth Rock.]]_

Lance froze at the last few moves listed. The first four had been observed in other Kabuto specimens of a similar power level, and while he wasn't all too familiar with the species, he had knowledge enough of them. The latter three moves listed were moves that required such special conditions to carefully breed into Kabuto; there were many breeders who dreamed of producing a pokémon with such a fine-tuned move set. Stealth Rock wasn't even a move that could be bred into Kabuto, at least according to the literature, something that this group of misfits seemed determined to destroy with their existence. The interference move was carefully taught to the Kabuto line by the most skilled trainers determined to unlock the pokémon's potential, and though Lance was starting to think that there was something unique about Ash, no six-year-old could possibly teach a novice pokémon such an advanced move.

It had been the same for Riolu, as well—moves that were not naturally in the pokémon and could only truly be implemented in the species through intense, careful training were already taught to her, as raw and untrained as she seemed.

"I'm sorry, Ash, do you know what sort of failure of DNA repair Kabuto was victim to?" Lance asked, carefully petting Kabuto's back.

Ash's blank look reminded him that he was speaking to a literal child.

"Right, never mind. Is his name Fossil, then?"

Ash looked confused at that question. "He is Project FOSSIL."

"Well, we call all pokémon that look like him 'Kabuto'. Many trainers also give their pokémon nicknames that don't match the names given to them all by scientists, so if you want, we can just start calling him Fossil from now on."

Ash's confusion didn't clear up. "He's Project FOSSIL, that's just what he is. They're all Projects," he said, pointing to Kabuto, then to Riolu, then to Pikachu, then to Porygon. Mewtwo floated impassively behind him.

"What about Mewtwo?" Lance asked gently.

"He's Mewtwo," Ash responded. "He is the final step of Project POKÉMON."

Lance felt like he should be taking notes in case there was some sort of investigation later. There was something sinister about the words that Ash stated in such a blasé manner, as though it were common knowledge that his companions were all the victims of someone's experimentation. As much as he wanted to leave the room and escape the wide, horribly innocent eyes of the boy and his pokémon family even if just briefly, he forced himself to ask one last question before changing the topic completely.

"Were you a Project, Ash?" Lance asked softly.

Ash scrunched up his face in thought before glancing over to Mewtwo for help. Mewtwo's eyes flickered over to Lance's and the mental presence settled into his mind again.

' _Boy-child son-father child-of-father leader-of-others leads-to-battle prepares-for-battle trains-for-battle trainer-trainer-trainer'_ ran through Lance's head.

Lance let that sink in before shaking off the dark path his thoughts were starting to take. He crouched down and let Fossil-Kabuto scuttle onto the ground before walking further into the room and taking a seat in a chair.

"Funnily enough, that's not what I came here to talk to you about," he said. "I wanted to let you know that a friend of mine, Scott, has a little girl that stays with him who you might find easier to talk to than me. She can come to stay in the League for a few days next week. Would you like to meet her?"

Ash once again looked confused. "Little girl?" he repeated. "Like Ari but small?"

"Who's Ari?" Lance asked, alarmed by how deeply Ash was still lost in his past.

"She's really big and really mean," Ash said, throwing his arms behind him nonchalantly.

"Big? How so?" Lance prompted. He wasn't quite running out of patience yet, but the urge to stand up and pace around the room was beginning to haunt him.

"Big!" Ash gestured with his arms, stretching them as high as they could go over him and then allowing them to drift closer to his form as he lowered them. "She liked to stand over us and call me 'Little Boy' and make funny noises at us. Mewtwo didn't like her, and I didn't neither, but sometimes she tried to bring us Pecha berries and do a weird thing with her teeth." Ash demonstrated by putting on an attempt at a completely disingenuous toothy grin.

"The proper grammar is 'I didn't either,'" Lance corrected, though he wasn't thinking too hard about Ash's butchering of Universal but of this distinctive woman. "Could you tell me what she looked like?"

Ash thought for a second. "She had head fur like berries," he said after a little bit. "And her eyes were like sparks."

"What do you mean, head fur like berries?" Lance asked.

"Like berries! Like—" Ash proceeded to make a series of strange growls in his effort to elaborate.

"I'm sorry Ash, I don't understand that language," Lance said. Ash looked baffled by that concept. "We might have to work a little bit on your Universal so that you can speak it just as well as you can speak to pokémon." He considered asking Mewtwo to translate for a brief second, though he knew that no official would take a pokémon's word as evidence to start investigating a person with, no matter how intelligent.

"Oh, ok." Ash looked thoughtful for a second. "Who's the little girl, again?"

Lance blinked. He had almost completely forgotten about his main goal in being there yet again. "Right, the little girl. Her name is Anabel. She's maybe a little younger than you. Scott claims that she has a special ability to bond with pokémon very well; I think she'd make a nice friend for you, someone that isn't a pokémon."

"Friend," Ash said slowly, pronouncing the word carefully.

"Yes, a friend. I wanted to tell you so that Scott and I didn't just spring a new person onto you. Would you be okay with meeting Anabel?"

Ash immediately nodded, though without some of his normal enthusiasm.

"Are you sure? Is there something wrong?"

Ash squirmed on the spot, shaking his head violently. Lance glanced over to Pikachu and Riolu, both of which were staring at Ash with what looked like panic, and then to Mewtwo, who looked resigned to explaining Ash's behavior again.

' _Human-bad-loom power-arrogance pokémon-small-good not-bad-not-evil'_ ran through Lance's head. It was a more convoluted stream of thoughts than what Mewtwo typically expressed, but it took only a few seconds longer than usual for Lance to parse them out.

"If she was a bad person, I wouldn't even think about letting her come near the League building itself. Scott is a very kind man who has earned the complete loyalty of his pokémon without using fear or dominance, like what you're used to. I trust his judgment when it comes to many things, including this child. However, if you're not comfortable with that idea yet, you don't have to meet her until you're ready."

Ash seemed slightly more open to the idea and glanced up towards Mewtwo. The pokémon didn't notice for a couple of seconds, but when he did, his eyes opened slightly with surprise and he looked about as though he was uncertain of how to respond.

For a brief second, Lance thought that Mewtwo just didn't want to exist to avoid the stress of having to decide for Ash.

The two looked at each other and Lance was suddenly aware that the room wasn't as silent as it seemed as they screamed at each other through their minds and their eyes. After a little while, Ash's placid expression broke, just for a split second, morphing into an animalistic snarl of outrage that was wiped away when Mewtwo responded in kind. Ash looked away and Mewtwo looked faintly triumphant. He reminded Lance of a child who just won the playground argument over which kind of cake was the best, or something equally inane.

Lance was struck by the strange way that Ash and Mewtwo interacted with each other. Maybe it was Ash's generally feral nature or Mewtwo's pointed and logical intelligence, but they acted on the whole as equals while even the most beloved of their companions seemed merely capable of complete loyalty and unconditional love, the way all pokémon acted.

Mewtwo glanced over to Lance. The Dragon Master wondered for a split second if his thoughts had been heard but knew that it didn't matter as Mewtwo looked at him with open complacence. Lance didn't know how he had won Mewtwo's trust so readily, but he hoped that he could prove worthy of such a gift.

Lance nodded. "Anabel will be here in a few days. I'll remind you the day before she's scheduled to arrive." With that he got up and began to head for the door. When he was almost there, he felt something run into his legs. Lance stopped abruptly and looked down to see Ash awkwardly wrapping his arms around Lance's waist. It was a strangely incorrect hug—Ash's hands slumped downward at the wrist and there was a space between Ash himself and Lance's body—but there was a tenderness to the action. Mewtwo seemed surprised by it as well. Lance just turned to hesitantly pat Ash's head and the boy looked up at him with a quirked closed-mouth smile that would have fit Pikachu.

"Thank you, sir," he said carefully.

"No need for the formalities, Ash. Feel free to just call me Lance. You'd be the only one in this building that does," Lance quipped. The joke flew over Ash's head, if his vacant blinking was any indication, but the smile remained at Lance's friendly tone. Ash detached himself from Lance's legs and wandered back over to his friends, allowing Lance to quietly slip away from the room.

* * *

Lance's first impression of Anabel was that she was a slip of a girl, small and timid and wide-eyed as she stared openly at everything Lance's office had to offer (surprisingly little, as Lance had convinced most of his team to stay in their Pokéballs for the day). She hugged a particularly fluffy Eevee to her chest. The little creature seemed disgruntled but allowed her to hold him close. Scott had a hand protectively on her shoulder, which seemed to be helping her calm down a little bit.

"She's a little shy," Scott said, not bothering to lower his voice. Anabel looked slightly mutinous at that, though she didn't speak up against him.

Lance hummed in response. Deino wandered up to Anabel, and Lance wondered for a brief moment if letting the dragon roam free with no warning was a good idea. Her kind was known for its generally vicious nature, and though Deino had been bred to be slightly more docile than the wild members of her species it was important to encourage her to maintain her friendliness, especially to strangers. That being said, a dragon with the reputation of evolving into what could be a mindless beast was never a creature that anyone wanted to see wandering with minimal supervision.

Anabel seemed startled when Deino walked up to her and began to sniff at her hand. Eevee started to growl, his tail flicking irritably, squirming more insistently to try and dart away from the dragon instinctively. Anabel loosened her grip slightly to let him tumble out of her arms, and Deino took that as an opportunity to lay her head on the little girl's arm. Anabel glanced from the dragon to Lance to Scott before looking back to Deino and carefully laying a hand on her head. She smiled at Deino's croon of happiness as she started to pet more confidently.

"Deino's much friendlier than she looks," Lance said, trying to keep his voice down to make it less intimidating for Anabel. Anabel just nodded, now transfixed on the smooth feeling of Deino's head scales.

"Well, no time like the now. Shall we go meet your little man?" Scott asked.

"He's not my 'little man,' or anyone's anything at all, Scott," Lance said automatically, getting up from his chair. Upon seeing Lance stand up and move to walk down the hall, Deino chirped and nudged her Pokéball at his belt, returning herself to stasis.

As was customary, Lance quietly knocked on the door and allowed Mewtwo to poke around in his head. A split second later, he realized that he forgot to warn Scott and Anabel that this would happen and quickly turned to calm their fears. Scott seemed baffled but intrigued, and Anabel didn't seem as freaked out as he would have anticipated.

"You're much calmer than I expected you'd be," Lance said.

Scott shrugged. "Psychic pokémon are known for their cautiousness and I'm more than accustomed to being scanned by Spenser's Claydol every time I step foot into the Battle Palace. Besides, Brandon showed up with a set of Regi Golems the other day, and after that, I can't admit to being surprised by anything."

Lance blinked. "How on earth did Brandon manage to get an entire trio of Golems to himself? I heard they were scarce, especially still functional ones." Regirock, Regice, and Registeel were strange pokémon, powerful enough to be classified as Legendaries but completely manmade, relics of a past in which pokémon and people were far more closely intertwined. Some said that Arceus itself came down and carved the Golems to protect the land now thought of as Hoenn, while more pragmatic archaeologists fervently attested that they were some sort of ancient technology given sentience. The only thing that the two sides truly agreed on was that no more would ever be made; the secret to their longevity and their power lay in the inner workings of the Golems, and to dismantle even one to unlock those secrets was considered sacrilegious and abusive. It was incredibly hard to find any left if you were a simple layperson, and though Brandon had connections as a researcher in his own right, discovering an individual of all of the Regi Golems in one place was a finding of its own.

Scott just chuckled slightly. "I've long since accepted that Brandon functions on his own agenda and that to question it is to embark on a weeks-long debate with the man. Anabel likes him well enough so I try and stay on his good side."

At the mention of her name, Anabel glanced up at Lance and seemed to withdraw into herself a little bit more. "Mr. Brandon is very smart," she said quietly. Her voice was a whisper, though Lance could still hear a throatiness to her tone that belied a forced maturity. "He talks to me like a grown-up, and Solrock likes to help me learn how to talk to Eevee." Eevee's ears twitched at the sound of Anabel's voice and he gave a squeaky yip in acknowledgment.

Lance attempted a kind smile at her. It seemed to work, as she shyly smiled back before dropping eye contact. He carefully pushed the door open a crack. "Ash? Anabel is here."

Ash was sitting on the stripped bed, with Fossil cradled in his lap and Porygon darting around his head. The Pokédex that Lance had given him lay somewhat haphazardly on the mattress beside him, and Pikachu seemed to be having a bit of fun batting at the buttons and seeing what they did. Riolu was watching Pikachu's actions and seemed to be pointing out whenever he missed a change. Scott poked Lance's shoulder to draw his attention and nodded towards Mewtwo. Lance stalled the question in his eyes with a shake of his head, promising silently to explain later.

Anabel walked in first, with Eevee winding around her feet in agitation. Judging by his stiff posture, Lance could tell that Eevee had realized that he was in another pokémon's territory and that he hadn't been welcomed in yet, and thus was on the lookout for anyone that could possibly be a danger to his trainer and himself. It was an instinctual action on Eevee's part, really. Anabel absentmindedly put a hand down to comfort Eevee but seemed distracted by the Pokéballs that Ash continued to leave untouched on the table. She scooped them up into her hands before turning to him.

"Do you have more friends in here?" she asked, cradling them gently.

Scott took a breath as if he was about to say something but Lance shook his head quickly, wanting to see what Ash's response would be.

The boy's eyes widened more before he shook his head violently. "Friends aren't in those," he said. Lance grimaced at the sharp tone he took on. Anabel jerked backwards as though Ash had snapped at her with his teeth rather than just his words; perhaps that's what it felt like to the young girl. Scott had given Lance just the bare-bones explanation to Anabel's strange power, so he wasn't sure what the action indicated or implied.

Anabel stepped back uncertainly, shying away from Ash's vitriol. "I-I'm sorry," she said quietly, putting the shrunken Pokéballs on the ground. "It's just that Mr. Brandon and Mr. Spenser always have their friends with them, even in business meetings and serious things, and they don't have to worry about them running away or being taken, so I thought that you had lots more friends that couldn't be inside."

Ash looked mutinous at the idea of keeping any pokémon in Pokéballs at all. "Friends can stay outside like they're meant to," he muttered, hugging Fossil to himself. The Kabuto merely waved his appendages happily, legs twitching to scuttle against Ash's arms.

Anabel looked lost, as though she didn't know how to respond to that. Eevee was glaring pointedly at the boy on the bed, remaining silent when Mewtwo's own gaze narrowed at the obviously hostile pokémon. Pikachu and Riolu had stopped playing with the Pokédex and were looking at the silent confrontation as well. After a couple of seconds, the two pokémon exchanged a glance before hopping off of the bed (getting a confused look from Ash and an alarmed one from Mewtwo as they did so) and approached Anabel carefully.

Pikachu blinked up at the girl, ignoring the steady crescendo of Eevee's warning growl. He gave a quiet chirp to her, settling on his hindquarters to look Anabel in the eyes before cocking his head sideways. Anabel giggled at the gesture and shook her head, smiling slightly. Pikachu seemed pleased with the interaction.

Riolu, in the meantime, had crouched by the Pokéballs. Lance saw Mewtwo extend a hand quickly, eyes with only a hint of glowing blue, but before he could do anything, Riolu had carefully tapped the button of the Pokéball in front of her. She gave a yelp of shock when the Pokéball gave its futuristic warning noise and opened suddenly, engulfing her in red light and drawing her into the capsule.

Pandemonium erupted. Ash scrambled off of the bed, screaming wordlessly and accidentally flinging Fossil to the floor (he didn't seem to mind, and Ash ended up picking him back up as he frantically but slowly scuttled towards the violently shaking Pokéball). Porygon began to make more complex laps across the room, its physical form shifting as it darted around. Mewtwo just stared in utter shock, eyes completely open and still only barely glowing, apparently thunderstruck that he wasn't able to move fast enough to prevent whatever had happened.

Anabel seemed overwhelmed by the sudden rush of forms towards her and she staggered backwards, wordlessly whimpering as Eevee stood bravely before her, snarling at the other pokémon in case one dared to approach her. Lance and Scott moved between Anabel and the group of feral creatures, each with a hand at his belt, prepared to defend her if need be from an impulsive attack.

Everyone watched with bated breath as the Pokéball began to stop gyrating wildly, Riolu having obviously calmed down appropriately to remember how the capsule worked. The Pokéball gave its customary success noise before relaxing into its inert state.

Ash broke the stillness by shouting "Amber!" as he leapt onto the Pokéball. He began to worry at the device with his teeth, his fingers, his hands, anything, trying to wrench it open somehow by sheer force. After that failed, he turned to Mewtwo with palms outstretched, the Pokéball sitting in his hands.

"Mewtwo, don't do anything," Lance called out as firmly as he could, shaken as he was by the sudden turn of events. "If you damage the Pokéball too much, there's a chance that she could be hurt before she can be converted back into her physical form."

Mewtwo was still frozen, his mind overwhelmed by everything.

"Ash," Lance said, still trying to contain the situation. "Just click the button on the front that Ri—Amber did. It'll release her back into the world, and you won't have to worry about breaking the ball to do so. Please."

Ash looked just as overwhelmed as Mewtwo was, and there were tears clinging to the corners of his eyes as he processed Lance's orders. With shaking hands, the boy pressed the button on the Pokéball.

The device obeyed, rotating in his hand to activate where it detected less heat and therefore a greater chance of an open space. Red light poured from the opened Pokéball and quickly manifested in a small canid form, fading as quickly as it appeared.

The Riolu blinked a couple of times before shaking her head to clear it of any final cobwebs. She looked down to her paws and flexed her toes. She seemed satisfied with her inspection and turned to Ash, who gripped the Pokéball in his hand so tightly that his knuckles began to turn white.

Ash looked terrified and ashamed at the same time: terrified, Lance thought, that Amber would turn on him, and ashamed for even considering such a possibility. He cautiously held out his empty hand to her, palm up.

Amber did not look at his hand, nor did she react to it. Instead, she walked towards Ash, crooning slightly. There was something strange in the way she spoke; rather than the smooth speech of growls and barks that Riolu usually communicated in, Amber sounded like the noises she was making were stuttered and half-garbled, inflections following human speech rather than the staccato of pokémon. She seemed frustrated by something before attempting to speak again, her annoyance making it harder for her to control her tongue. Lance and Scott exchanged a bewildered look before glancing to Anabel, who seemed distraught.

"What's happening, Anabel?" Scott asked quietly.

"They're so sad for her," Anabel whispered. "But she's happy? Not exactly happy. She feels like she's remembering something sad but isn't sad about it herself. It's like she's remembering what it feels like to fall asleep and kinda halfway there."

Lance had no idea what to make of the girl's strange words. Scott merely held out an arm, inviting Anabel to run over and bury her head into the side of his body. Lance looked back at the strange ensemble to see that Mewtwo had floated over to hover by Ash, wearing the same stricken look that the boy did.

"Life is wonderful," Ash whispered, the tone of his voice slightly off, as though he were remembering something and didn't know he had said anything at all. Mewtwo remained silent, eyes staring at Amber.

The Riolu was silent now, but after a second, she held her arms out in a gesture similar to Scott's. Ash instantly dove onto her, tears finally falling, as he collapsed in relief that Amber hadn't changed from her experience as red light. Mewtwo watched on solemnly, though his posture seemed to relax slightly as it folded in onto himself.

Another bright flash of red light startled all of the occupants in the room. They all glanced over to see that Pikachu had stepped backwards and hit one of the other Pokéballs with his tail, his panic sending the capsule bouncing across the floor. Ash reached down and picked the Pokéball up once it stopped jerking around, and Pikachu poured out, hissing in displeasure at the device. He scrunched up his nose and turned away from the Pokéball pointedly.

Ash was silent for a second, watching Pikachu's injured pride, before he gave a slight snort. The quiet noise attracted Amber's attention, and she coughed out a quiet laugh of her own. In a couple of seconds, the boy and the Riolu were laughing hysterically, the tension of the room lost in the catharsis of their howls. Mewtwo finally twitched at the release of emotion, settling backwards as a small grin began to curve across his face. Lance found himself cracking a smile at their antics, and when he looked over, Scott was chuckling as Anabel's shoulders shook, even though her face was still buried in the man's patterned shirt.

"Silly Egg," Ash said out loud between laughs, making the Pikachu's fur crackle with static that he irritably shook out before pointedly turning his back on them all and jumping back onto the bed to curl up and tuck his nose under his tail.

As his amusement died down, Ash seemed more thoughtful. He looked down to the two Pokéballs in his hands and contemplated them. Anabel had looked to Scott after controlling her own giggles (Lance wondered briefly if her laughter had been caused by the overwhelming mirth in the room rather than by her own reaction to Egg's haughtiness) and when released, began to pick her way back over to Ash.

"Now they're yours forever," she said softly. Ash didn't even look to her as he nodded, still staring at the Pokéballs in his hands.

"Ash, be polite," Lance said somewhat sternly. "Look to Anabel if you want to respond to her, please."

Ash's head jerked up at Lance's gentle admonishment, having never been corrected by the man in such a manner. He looked ready to argue for a split second before deflating and looking at Anabel with resignation. Anabel blinked away her surprise that he was actually listening and pointed at the Pokéballs again.

"You can make them smaller again by clicking the button when they're inside," she explained. "They make clothes that you can stick them onto, so then they can't ever leave you."

"Who's they?" Ash ventured, finally putting the Pokéballs back down on the table (Lance noticed that one of them sparked with latent static still while the other seemed completely normal).

Anabel looked as though she was going to answer, then furrowed her brow. She glanced at Scott and Lance questioningly.

"Designers, Anabel," Scott provided. Anabel's expression lit up and she nodded sagely at Ash.

"Yes, that," she added helpfully.

Ash only seemed more confused. "What's designers?" he asked.

"I really need to give him a crash course in human civilization soon, don't I?" Lance muttered to himself. The smirk on Scott's face implied that he agreed completely with that thought.

* * *

"Why doesn't Ash eat here with us?" Anabel asked that evening. Lance had taken a short break from running his team through their flying drills to meet up with her and Scott for dinner, surprising the maintenance staff by asking for a longer table to be put in his office for that very reason.

Lance busied himself with the food on his plate for a second, trying to figure out the best way to respond to Anabel's innocent question. When he glanced back at her, she was staring at him patiently, waiting for a response.

"He never really wanted to leave that room before, or at least, he's never said that he wants to. We bring him the food he eats and he leaves the dishes for the staff to collect. If he wants to join us here, then he is more than welcome to." Anabel nodded, staring at her lap as she did so.

"Anabel, stop feeding your carrots to Eevee," Scott added in, not even looking up from his own plate as he did so.

Anabel started slightly, dropping the last remnant of cooked carrot onto the ground where Eevee lapped it up, stuttering out an apology to her guardian. After a short silence, she glanced up at Lance again. "But if he said that he wanted to, he could?" she asked.

Lance wondered what she was trying to ask for. "Of course. He's welcome to go wherever he pleases in the building, just so long as he doesn't get into too much trouble. Once his companions are more comfortable with the concept of Pokéballs, I can start giving him a basic education in training and what it means to train with your pokémon, and he'll probably start lessons with the other Masters here when they're available."

"I've also been in contact with some of the Sinnoh branch," Scott said. "They're working on tracking down a small village off of the coast of Iron Island that is apparently connected to the study of Aura. Might be a helpful lead for you." Lance nodded in thanks.

Anabel's gaze drifted over to the other corner of Lance's expansive office, where some of his smaller dragons lay in a relaxed but alert state. They were there as a secondary set of guards to the room, as well as keeping Lance company in the long and quiet days he used to spend. Altaria was in his usual place, perched on the rough scales that protruded from Haxorus's back, and while the Unovan dragon had both of his eyes closed in a mockery of sleep, Altaria watched the dining trio with an attentive eye. Anyone unfamiliar with the bird would find him unnerving, as his gaze never faltered from the table, but Lance knew that he wasn't staring at any occupant in particular but at the bowl of seasoned and roasted chesto berries.

"Would they be here if Ash was here?" Anabel asked, knowing that Lance knew who she was referring to.

He gave a silent nod of affirmation.

"Why?"

Lance blinked. "I guess it's because they like being out of stasis, as most pokémon do," he said, "and also because they like keeping an eye on me. If someone came in that they didn't like, they would be able to do something about it much more quickly if they're in the corner rather than in their Pokéballs."

Anabel seemed to think very hard about this. "They're nice though, right? So it should be fine."

Lance had the feeling that she wasn't talking about his dragons anymore. "I think it will be fine, but I can't guarantee that," he admitted. "My dragons are far more intuitive than I'll ever be, and I trust their judgment over mine most of the time. If they don't think that Ash and his friends are okay, it might be harder to convince them otherwise."

Anabel looked surprisingly untroubled by that. "They won't think that they're not okay," she said with an air of certainty.

"Why do you think that?" Lance couldn't help but ask.

"Because Ash is like them. They would be angry about sneaky people, but Ash can't be sneaky at all. He's not good at hiding anything," she said in a very matter-of-fact tone. "Mewtwo's more fun to listen for. He thinks too hard. I think he tries to think for both himself and for Ash sometimes."

"Anabel, be nice," Scott said, though mildly enough to convey that he wasn't actually trying to stop her. Regardless, she quieted down, going back to picking at the potatoes and carrots on her plate.

The next day, Ash and Mewtwo joined them at the table.

Lance didn't ask what Anabel had done or said to them to convince them to come along, merely called the kitchen and asked for two more servings of the risotto they had been presented that evening. Mewtwo seemed confused as to what to do with the utensils presented to him and watched Lance eat before clumsily picking up a spoon with his spherical fingers. Ash also didn't seem to know what to do with the utensils and resorted to carefully scooping the risotto up with his fingers and licking the food off. After a few attempts at this method, Mewtwo lifted up the spoon Ash had been presented with and tapped him between the eyes with it. When Ash gave him a stink eye in response, Mewtwo calmly ignored him, still struggling to balance the spoon between his fingers.

"If it's more comfortable for you, Mewtwo, feel free to levitate the spoon," Lance said, choosing to pointedly ignore Ash's bad manners. He felt like being smacked with a spoon was punishment enough for such actions.

For the first time, Lance heard Mewtwo make a verbal noise. It was a strange combination between a grunt and a purr, resonating in his chest, and there was a moment when Lance almost expected him to say something in Universal. That moment never came; Mewtwo's eyes simply glowed a light blue and the spoon in his hands lifted up delicately to direct the food to his mouth.

Lance felt a mental nudge. _'Good-berry-fill happy-grateful-warm warm-like-strange good-strange-good'_ ran through his mind before the presence pulled away. He simply nodded to Mewtwo in acknowledgement. "I'll pass it along to the cook," he said.

Ash had started using the spoon at this point, though his manners were still atrocious as he scooped the risotto up with such fervor that he spilled some everywhere. He didn't seem to mind, simply trying to eat quickly and desperately.

"Ash, slow down, it's not going to be taken away from you," Lance said. Ash froze and stared at him as though he hadn't even considered that possibility, cheeks bulging slightly. Lance sighed. "Forget I said anything. Just don't give yourself a stomachache."

Anabel had been quiet the entire time during dinner, choosing instead to stare wide-eyed at Ash's messy habits while occasionally spooning food into her own mouth. She didn't seem surprised by his behavior, though she did seem slightly taken aback by the enthusiasm of Ash's appetite.

"I told you it's better than what you used to eat before," Anabel said quietly, a slight hint of smugness in her tone. Lance looked over to Scott briefly, who seemed simultaneously surprised by this revelation and amused by Anabel's attitude.

"Ifth goom," Ash mumbled around a mouthful.

"Ash, please chew and swallow before answering. You'll be more easily understood and it's not nice to make people see your half-eaten food." Lance was starting to grow weary of constantly correcting Ash's mannerisms, though he was fairly certain he shouldn't have waited this long to begin with. The boy blinked at him owlishly before making a large effort to swallow the mouthful he had. When he started to half-choke, Mewtwo looked over with a withering gaze until Ash regained his breath.

' _Time-time-time-again repeat-tire-bore,'_ Mewtwo briefly conveyed to Lance, who was glancing at Ash nervously as the boy struggled slightly. Lance wasn't sure if the knowledge that Ash regularly stuffed himself in that manner was as reassuring as Mewtwo seemed to have intended for it to be.

He was about to let Ash know that his food wouldn't run away if he didn't eat fast enough when he heard a musical trill. Altaria had hopped off of Haxorus and slowly approached Ash and Mewtwo. His gaze twitched back and forth between the two newcomers, twittering at them again when they just stared at him openly.

"Altaria is telling them how to use a spoon," Anabel said out loud.

"How does Altaria know how to use a spoon?" Scott asked.

Anabel shrugged. "By watching people?" she guessed.

Altaria's sudden lesson in manners seemed surprisingly well-received, more so than Lance's were, anyways. Mewtwo seemed to derive some sort of confidence that he was using the utensils correctly while Ash snatched the spoon up and scooped up the food with exaggerated slowness, looking directly at Altaria as he inched it towards his mouth. Altaria gave a reproachful chirp at his antics, fluffing his feathers up in a display of haughtiness.

Lance briefly wondered when his life had turned into some sort of cartoon. Anabel giggled at his exasperation.

* * *

The next time Lance visited Ash, Anabel and Scott had returned to their homes. They hadn't been able to stay for too long and Lance had been training whenever Anabel decided that she wanted to drop in on the boy. She was fascinated by him, Scott had confided, and she was invested in seeing him open up to others and allow the world to welcome him. She expected that he would be a charismatic, happy person, and she wanted to help facilitate that into happening as soon as it could. It had taken Scott a lot of persuading to convince her that three days wasn't enough to truly affect Ash, and he had relented in allowing Anabel to return once she completed the next step of her education with him.

Now, of course, it was time for Ash to start his education.

Lance stopped knocking on the door, opting for waiting until Mewtwo cracked the door open instead. He peered in.

A lot had changed in the room in the weeks since Ash had first arrived. The sheets weren't stripped from the bed but in a messy pile on top of it that betrayed that Ash and his friends curled up together in a nest of white cloth. The Pokéballs, once left untouched in their orderly pile, were strewn somewhat haphazardly across a table; after Egg and Amber had proven unchanged, the other pokémon found some amusement in claiming their own Pokéball. Of course, not even that simple milestone was crossed uneventfully, as when Porygon (or Program, as Ash called it) reemerged from its Pokéball, it hadn't reformed correctly, though the adaptor for it on the Pokédex had somehow recombined the coding-given-life into a strange mass of what appeared to Lance as sentient pixels. At least, most of the time. At other times, a strange, featureless ghost manifested, and at others, skeletons of ancient pokémon formed. Program didn't seem affected by this, just generally confused and slightly saddened at the loss of its stable form though it seemed satisfied to have a form at all. When Lance had tried to see what the Pokédex said about it, it had whirred, made a set of staticky noises, and grown uncomfortably warm as it tried to analyze the data it was given (worrying Lance quite a bit) before reciting _[[Pokémon not recognized. Missing numbers detected. No description given. Probable level- ?. Sex and Nature of pokémon not found. Moves known- Water Gun, Water Gun, Pay Day, Bind, Sky Attack, Thunder]]._

Why was Water Gun listed twice? Lance was more worried about a possible Pokédex malfunction than by the oddity that Program was, quite frankly; perhaps if it had only been Program who was so bizarre he would have cared more, but the revelations of Amber's heightened Aura, Fossil's unnatural moveset, and the terrifying agility that Egg had shown off to Anabel (which was offset by an enormous amount of calories that he had to consume) had long since jaded him to something new being discovered. If what Ash had told him about the pokémon was true, none of them were meant to be 'the norm' anyhow.

Right now, of course, Program was hovering by the TV as it enjoyed doing. As Lance watched, it dove into the cords of the screen again and appeared looking like a rotund green dummy that bounced around merrily before exiting the screen as a fossilized bat, its features not defined enough to determine which specific species. It fluttered over to Ash and landed on his head with a sound like static from the carpet. Ash glanced up slightly before turning around to see Lance, grinning widely. Lance marveled at how far the boy had come in how relaxed and trusting he was now, even if it was only when they were interacting by themselves.

"How are you doing, Ash?" Lance called out, slowly approaching. No matter how comfortable Ash was with him, Lance made sure to take precautions to keep his draconic side tamed.

There was a reason why so many of the most powerful trainers in the world were type specialists. The world was full of latent energy that manifested in ways innumerable in both pokémon and humans. The most obvious example of this was in the human psychics, whose exposure to the pokémon they trained alongside resulted in heightened mental facilities offset by fragile physical bodies, but other specialists still acquired some additional traits, though perhaps more subtly. Mixing type specialties was its own tightrope to walk on; very rarely did a human try to specialize in both fighting- and psychic-type energies, for the two demanded such vastly different lifestyles that few humans' bodies could stand the duality, while some chose to specialize in ice and water for the two elements' close similarities. To be a general specialist was to somehow balance the confluence of numerous types and their different physical or mental demands, which required far more mental focus than many early trainers were willing to devote. It was humanity's individual adaptation that made them the dominant species in the planet: without the power of choice, the world would be run by little more than the primal energies that dictated pokémon instincts, best described by the histories of rampant Legendaries destroying and rebuilding the planet to their whimsy.

Lance's chosen type granted to him a fierce intimidation and self-confident pride. He had always had what some might call arrogance, but the years of training his dragons imbued in him a presence that could not be ignored, that screamed to be respected and to reign over all others, as well as a sense of justice that had to be addressed whenever a grievance was registered. Truly, Lance became a dragon in his own right, commanding and demanding all honors be given and upheld. Energies manifested differently in everyone; Lance's own cousin, Clair, was also a Dragon Master (though not the region's most powerful, a title that Lance wore), but her training led her to an icy calm and a regal aura that demanded perfection from those surrounding her, sitting back to mete justice from behind castle walls while watching over all. Lance had always scoffed at her maturing attitude; to sit back and do nothing while others fawned over you was the worst offense to his inner dragon, and he never cared about muting himself when commanding attention and action had always carried him through his career.

He quite thought that Clair would laugh in his face if she knew how subdued he had to act around a schoolchild.

Ash shrugged. "It's good. Anabel was nice to talk to, but she yelled a lot."

Lance couldn't reconcile that description with the shy lilac-haired girl he had just seen off the day before. "She seemed rather quiet to me," he said.

"She always yelled with her head. It gave Mewtwo a headache but he's too nice to say that," Ash said matter-of-factly. Lance chuckled inwardly at that description, glancing at the figure meditating silently in the corner.

"Is that right? How interesting. Anyhow, I came here to ask if you would be willing to start in on a basic education while you're here. You may be allowed to leave at any time, but other humans won't expect to see you on your own for another five or so years, and you might like learning things here before heading out into the world. Some of the other Masters and their pokémon here would be helping you learn too. How would you feel about that?"

Ash seemed far more willing to at least consider meeting new people after Anabel and Scott's visit. "What're Masters?" he asked.

"Masters are humans who spend their entire Trainer life studying pokémon to figure out how to make them the best," Lance explained. "Most of them align with one type to focus their research. They also have to go through a series of trials—tests, if that makes more sense—to prove to the world that they're as good as they say they are. It takes a lot of work to get there, but everyone with the title has proven that they're willing to put in that work, which makes them more respectable. Am I making sense?"

Ash bobbed his head. "Can I meet them first?" he asked, which surprised Lance more than he wanted to admit.

"Of course. Three of them have rooms here that they occasionally use, while the others aren't always here and might ask to engage in shorter but more intense stretches of time while they're available. Quite a few of the Masters will be in the League for a yearly meeting, actually, as well as some other respected figures from Kanto. You could meet them all then as my charge."

Ash's head tipped sideways in confusion. "Kanto?"

Lance stifled a sigh; he had completely forgotten Ash's relative ignorance in all things human. "Right. The human world is scientifically and politically divided up into different chunks. We are currently in the Tohjo League, which spans the Kanto and Johto regions. These two areas were originally just one before the Civil War a century back, which resulted in the split but shared government. Am I making a little sense?" At Ash's nod, Lance continued. "Let me know at any point if it doesn't. Anyhow, the other regions have similar Leagues that help organize them and unify the many cities. Currently, Hoenn, Sinnoh, Unova, and Kalos are the other recognized League regions; Alola, a group of islands in a tropical area of the world, is currently trying to build a League for themselves, though it's set up quite differently than what we've got. A couple of other regions exist under different organizations; Almia, Fiore, and Oblivia were much smaller and chose a Ranger-centric life where pokémon and humans coexist in a much friendlier context and thus didn't need the challenge of the League to get only the best humans working with pokémon. Another region, Orre, is working to unify and then set up a League, though they're a long way away from any sort of success. The layperson likes to think that the Leagues are all of one organization, and we do generally work as though we are. However, it makes the most sense to run ourselves individually, no matter how much we are cooperating with each other, as everyone knows what their region demands better than any foreigner could. The Leagues aren't the only thing connecting the regions. People like Scott set up other organizations that bring people from the regions together, and they're generally regarded as welcome to those who don't like battling, which is mainly how the Leagues determine rankings. The Leagues also put on biannual events that test the trainers that work through them to make sure that everything is still functional, though people think it's to recruit others into the League itself. Most members of the League ask to join; others are asked to join, but those are rare."

Lance realized that he had been rambling a bit. "Any last questions?" he asked.

Ash looked thoughtful. "What does 'tropical' mean?"

Lance blinked. He then let out a loud groan and settled into a chair, prepared to start at the very least the boy's literary education as soon as he could.

* * *

 **I wasn't going to end on an exposition dump, but this is both a clean stopping point and is starting to get unnecessarily long. Uni started up again and I've got more classes than I should, as well as two jobs and meetings for a student-run theater production, so I can't guarantee when I next update. I can guarantee more Ash/Mewtwo interactions with non-Lance humans soon, as well as some time jumps to get to a time that I'd prefer to be at. As always, please leave a review if you have thoughts and I'll try my best to get to them.**


	3. Training

In hindsight, Lance should probably have asked Agatha to meet Ash last. He had brought up in a meeting with the other members of the Elite Four (a misnomer for those in the know) that he wanted Ash to start interacting with people more, since Anabel had managed to at the very least soften the shell he forged to combat human interaction before. Lorelei had been openly interested in helping with Ash's schooling and Bruno his typical stoic self, but Lance hadn't expected the dry chuckles from Agatha and an insistence on meeting the boy as soon as she could. She was so eager to meet him, it seemed, that she was following Lance as he went to check up on Ash immediately after their meeting.

"Wouldn't it be better to give him some warning of a visitor?" Lance tried, though he was resigned to succumbing to the older trainer's stubbornness.

Just as he expected, Agatha simply scoffed. "You coddle the boy, Lance," she said. "It is more welcome than ignoring him, but one day he will have to meet other people without being briefed on them all and it is healthy for him to start getting used to unexpected visitors now. I do know how to behave myself around children, you know."

Lance decided not to point out that Agatha hadn't really interacted with a child in years and that the last time she had, the boy had run away with tears in his eyes.

When they arrived in front of the now familiar doors, Agatha wasted no time in banging on them with the bottom of her cane. Lance could feel Mewtwo's agitation in his frenetic scan of his mind; Agatha's quiet cackling told Lance that she felt his panic as well (and relished it). Before Mewtwo could open the door, Agatha strode in, a faint snicker echoing through her shadow. Lance sighed before following suit.

Lance might have tried to tone down his aura, but Agatha certainly didn't. Her shadow shifted and blinked before embracing her legs, lapping at her shoes as though she were walking through a puddle of oily, liquid darkness. Eyes blinked from the pool of unnatural darkness at her feet.

Ash didn't seem unnerved by this at all. If anything, he seemed intrigued, though Mewtwo was frozen as he stared at the living shadow. Lance made a mental note to somehow accustom Mewtwo to the reality-destroying beings that were Ghosts as soon as he could.

"You, boy," Agatha said. Lance bit back his immediate urge to tell her to stop and to shield Ash behind himself.

Ash said nothing but looked Agatha in the eye. There was a challenging glint in his gaze; Lance almost groaned out loud at his nerve.

Agatha stared back balefully before bursting into loud cackles. The shadow at Agatha's feet suddenly formed into her two Gengar, who joined in her dry mirth, wrapping themselves around her legs and snickering into her ears. She chuckled at some unintelligible hiss that one uttered before sinking back into her shadow, soon followed by the other.

"You'll do well not to lose that boldness, child," she said. Agatha turned back to Lance. "I've seen enough. I return to my domain and my own children. Let me know if you require my assistance." She walked out of the room; one of the Gengar coalesced again and gave Ash one last high-pitched breath of a laugh before melting away and vanishing.

Lance, Ash, and Mewtwo all stood in silence for a couple of seconds after Agatha's departure. Finally, Lance sighed, breaking the forged tension.

"I'm sorry about Agatha. She does quite enjoy terrifying anyone and everyone that she meets. I can assure you that you won't have to interact with her too much, at least, until you want to learn her specific craft. The other local Elites and I will be taking over your basic education before the other Kanto Masters arrive for our annual meeting."

Ash just blinked up at him.

' _Meet-new-face new-face-new-face bad?-scared?-uncertain? what-do-confused-what-do-wh—'_

"You'll both be fine, Mewtwo. I've asked them to include you in the education as I'm sure you will be more than interested in it. Lorelei plans to teach you the basics that all children should learn—maths, basic language, some history. Bruno will help you train your body as well as your control; it might be a bit over your head at this point but it will be just as useful in the future. If you'd like, I can sit in the first few sessions with both of them, and I'm more than happy to alert them if you are feeling uncomfortable at any point."

Mewtwo said nothing, though the relief in his expression was surprisingly easy to read. He nodded fervently, which Lance was tempted to chuckle at.

"How would you feel about starting your classes in a couple of days?" Lance proposed. "I don't want to spring new people on you so suddenly, but Bruno is insistent that you must start your training with him soon and he can be just as impatient as anyone else. I will gather you in the morning and take you to the basic training grounds that we have available in this building. Does that sound good?"

Ash just nodded. Mewtwo's presence flickered into Lance's head to blare affirmation.

Lance nodded back. "Good. I'll leave you to your own devices now. I hope you find your lessons as enjoyable as you can."

Ash nodded again, unknowing to the dread with which most students viewed schoolwork. Lance had a feeling that he would soon know of that quintessential boredom.

Sure enough, within the week, Ash was dragging his feet to his lessons with Lorelei.

The Ice Master was not a harsh taskmaster like some tutors might have been. She was strict, to be sure, but fair and tried to customize her lessons to better suit the student that she had. Or rather, students. Mewtwo turned out to be a far more intrigued pupil and insisted on accompanying Ash to lessons solely so that he could also partake in them. Many times had Lance walked past the room that he had set up as their makeshift classroom (it had previously been an unused office space, and really, the League was purposefully built to be large and imposing and have many unused rooms, so what was the point of keeping that one empty?) to find Ash staring blankly at a sheet of paper while Mewtwo had grabbed hold of a pencil with his mind and was feverishly writing with it. As Lance watched, the wood of the pencil suddenly splintered and Mewtwo frustratedly dropped the now useless writing implement, picking up another one and brushing the two halves into a small pile that was forming. For her part, Lorelei seemed vaguely amused by both of her students and was carefully explaining something on Ash's worksheet to him, though he didn't seem to understand. After a little bit, Lorelei seemed to sigh and say something to Ash that perked him up and sent up running out of the door. Mewtwo got up slightly more reluctantly to chase after him. As Lorelei rearranged the worksheets, Lance knocked on the doorframe to alert her to his presence.

Of course, given the always-alert Froslass that floated at Lorelei's side, he probably didn't even need to give her the warning.

Lorelei nodded at him, barely looking up from her simple task. "How can I help you, Lance?" she asked.

"I just wanted to check in on Ash's progress," he said.

She chuckled at that; Froslass gave a similar sound that spoke of the whisper of pines in a frigid breeze. "He's doing as well as I'd expect him to. Impatient when it comes to work, though that is to be expected from a child as energetic as he—have you thought to give him an intake?"

Lance was slightly taken aback. "An intake? What for?"

Lorelei sighed to herself. "Of course, you haven't. Why would you? I suspect that a lot of Ash's distracted nature and energy comes from undiagnosed childhood ADHD. I don't think it is severe enough to warrant medication of any kind, but knowing if that's the cause would make it easier to plan lessons around him as well as give him some reassurance that it isn't expected of him to sit still and be able to focus."

Lance blinked. Lorelei's casual diagnosis definitely made sense. In fact, it made so much sense that Lance felt foolish for not noticing earlier. It was almost routine for most children to get an intake prior to starting their journeys, if only to diagnose possibly emerging mental problems so that prescriptions could be written before children were lost to nature. It might have been Ash's age that made Lance forget; the boy was so young, after all, and the typical child getting a routine intake was twice his age in years.

Lorelei smirked slightly at his dumbfounded expression. "I expect you'll have more to talk about with Sabrina than you originally thought," she quipped before handing Lance a sheet of paper. A quick glance at it revealed that it was Ash's report card equivalent. "I gave him a quick preview of Kanto's history today. He seemed most intrigued by the concept of war between pokémon and humans. You may be nudged about this later. Also, might I suggest that you confer with someone to teach him some basic etiquette? While Ash is doing remarkably well under the circumstances, he really needs to work on basic manners. He's not a rude child, just one that doesn't know how to act quite often, from what I can tell, and none of us have any time to mentor him in such a way. Perhaps you could ask Master Samuel? He has a grandson around Ash's age; it might do him well to meet another child and learn to get along with someone that isn't Anabel."

Lance sighed out a chuckle. "Once again, Lorelei, you prove to me your intelligence," he admitted. "I'll look into both an intake and perhaps ask the Professor if he'd be willing to talk to Ash—and I'm sure he would—at the upcoming meeting."

Lorelei made a slight face. "Ah, yes. Why must we continue with the charade that we only meet during those few days every year?"

Lance snorted. "People need to think we have some sort of structure."

Lorelei gave a noncommittal hum. "Regardless." She briskly moved on. "Now, Mewtwo? A fascinating specimen, you must also admit. He absorbs knowledge like a sponge and dispenses it just as quickly. Right away he was able to understand the nuances of the wars, despite being as tripped up by the concept of war between humans and pokémon as Ash was. He is also a much more willing student, which makes tutoring the two a bit more relaxing than it otherwise would have been. I don't have too much to report on him, so I'll give you the physical report tomorrow with the two days' progress on it. If you're interested, I believe I sent Ash off to his physical training with Bruno; he was thinking about incorporating all of the pokémon today. It might be enlightening for you to watch."

"Really? I might just stop by, then." Lance gave Lorelei one final nod. "Thank you again for helping me."

"It truly is my pleasure, Lance," Lorelei said. She straightened her papers with one last firm movement before leaving the room without much fanfare. Lance still held Ash's daily report in his hand, and he pulled a chair out from the table to look at it more carefully.

Despite what Lorelei had said about a potential learning disability, Ash had covered at least a month's worth of material in the past couple of weeks, though perhaps that said more about her teaching skills than it did his learning skills. He seemed to understand but not enjoy arithmetic, his writing skills and grammar were atrocious (and were even marked as his greatest educational handicap), and apparently had entered Lorelei's lessons already knowing so much martial history that someone had to have educated him in it already. That wasn't to say that his understanding was too advanced; Ash knew far too much about the motivation of some of the wars that marked Tohjo's past, but he didn't know the nuances of war the way that a teenager might begin to understand. Lorelei hadn't started testing him on his biology knowledge yet, though Lance had a suspicion that Ash intimately knew the details of those pokémon that were constantly around him and wouldn't care about too many others.

Lance huffed out a breath as he stood up, folding the report in half and sticking it into his pocket. It would go into a manila folder in his office with all of his other daily reports, but he decided to head to the courtyard to see what Bruno really was up to.

The courtyard that Bruno had chosen for his lessons was hidden deep within the League and could only be accessed by those who knew it existed and had been led into it by another person. It was smaller than most of the other spaces that the League held, but it was noteworthy in its location—three hallways started in the courtyard and led down into personal rooms for the Masters, whenever they were to visit. Of course, only four of them were occupied regularly; all of the other Masters opted to stay in other cities, watching over their section of the region and masquerading as weaker versions of themselves to challenge wandering trainers. Lance still wasn't sure why Bruno had chosen this part of the inner sanctum to teach Ash; there were training grounds with packed earth and equipment that had been prepared for trainees, and despite Ash being so young he could technically be considered as such.

It was just cresting late afternoon now, and shadows were beginning to lengthen. All of Ash's pokémon were present—Amber and Egg were alert, sitting up and staring at the two humans with enthusiasm. Program seemed to be lazily floating in the air, a mass of visual static this time. Fossil scuttled around their feet, apparently more amused by the seeds that blew through the air occasionally. Ash and Mewtwo stood in front of Bruno, postures relaxed but still tense as though waiting for the Fighting Master to dash at them without any warning.

The grass whispered around Lance's feet. Mewtwo seemed to notice and was about to look over when the Pancham that had been following Bruno around snapped at him, chattering angrily while still sitting legs crossed. Mewtwo looked infinitesimally more uneasy then and shot Lance what he thought was an apologetic look before closing his eyes and letting his head hang loosely.

"Find the connection," Bruno said, his voice hoarse from lack of use. "It must lead from you and to your friends, your comrades, your family. Even if they are not here, you should be able to feel them. Their hearts beat with you, their souls resonate with your own—can you hear it, Ash?"

The boy nodded silently.

"Speak. Let your voice echo."

"Yes," Ash whispered, enraptured by Bruno's words.

"You know this as Aura. We who are not gifted with the sight know this as friendship, fellowship. It is foolish to believe that any talk of a bond with your pokémon is metaphorical—we are forged through the connections, and the Aura is our guide. It will connect you to everything and everyone, if you let it. You must be careful, though, for to be connected with the world is to allow the world to connect to you. That is dangerous, Ash, and you must keep in mind that you are opening yourself up to frailty by connecting to the world and that you are closing your mind to that free-flowing power by disconnecting yourself. There is no good or bad in the world, only pain, and you must be careful not to cause it when you choose not to."

A moment of silence passed. Lance felt as though he was trespassing on some moment, as though if he were to take another step forward the earth would tremble and swallow him whole for such indiscretions. Lance hadn't gotten his position by being a headstrong mess though—at least, not all of the time—and as such he was content with standing and waiting for the others in the courtyard to acknowledge his presence and allow him entry into their training session.

His patience was timely awarded. Bruno did not say anything to him but merely held up a welcoming hand. Lance nodded at the gesture and took a step or two forward.

"I see that you have had some success, Bruno," he said neutrally.

"Quite. He is open to the more scholarly teachings and wants to know more. Both are necessary in this path forward. Today we see what it is that they can do and tomorrow we refine them while teaching them the philosophies required to hone one's body. They are precocious; it is good."

Lance nodded. "Would you mind if I watched?" he asked.

Bruno shook his head before turning back to Ash. The boy had a look of determination on his face.

"One at a time. Show me your skill."

Ash nodded before taking a few steps back, Mewtwo matching him.

"Fossil," the boy said. Without missing a beat, the Kabuto scurried in front of him, evidently ready to demonstrate his skill.

Bruno flicked his wrist downwards, revealing a Pokéball that bounced on the ground to release the hulking figure of a scarred Machamp. Lance knew enough about the creature to debunk most of the mythos surrounding him (that he was drugged into his strength, that he was somehow part-Psychic and could fling a lesser pokémon across the room with his mind alone), but that didn't prevent him from being an imposing presence. Bruno had been able to match one of Lance's highly trained Dragonite with Machamp alone. He was well deserving of the respect and reputation that he held.

Machamp looked down at the boy and his strange pokémon companion, and then at the tiny Kabuto in front of him. He gave Bruno a distinctly unimpressed look.

Bruno said nothing in response, but that didn't prevent Machamp from relaxing and taking a defensive stance. Bruno looked over to Ash, gesturing for him to continue.

Ash didn't say words to communicate to his pokémon. He gave a single sharp trill, followed by a sharp open-mouthed growl to cut it off, and immediately Fossil responded, pressing his claws into the earth to crack the ground and summon up spires of rock. The Kabuto followed this up by releasing streams of green tendrils that dove into the ground and emerged at the base of the rock spires, traveling up seamlessly until it reached the tips, at which point the tendrils relentlessly continued onward, half of them latching onto Machamp while the other half wove into themselves, creating a net of sorts. After the display of power, Fossil nervously crawled back and forth, either in an attempt to make himself less open to attack or in an expression of its actual anxiety in the situation.

It was a complex move devoid of any extraneous movement, which implied that Ash, or more likely someone else, had worked with Fossil to develop it. It was a complex trap that played to all of the Kabuto's strengths and left very little room for weakness to show, and any lesser pokémon, even those stronger than the small rock-water-type would have found themselves helpless for just a second too long, setting themselves up for an additional attack. It was a smart move, a strategic move, and not one that any small child would have come up with.

Bruno's shoulders stiffened. Lance knew the man enough to read that he was surprised in that single action, but it quickly faded away.

"Break free," he instructed. Machamp grunted before allowing the tendrils to wrap fully around one set of arms and flexing them, throwing them to his sides. A typical pokémon would have been more trapped in the energy-stealing vines, but Machamp was undeterred as he broke free of practically all of them in a single movement and stepped forward, bringing his other set of arms down to destroy the sharp stones that faced him. He gave Fossil a jeering smile as the Kabuto more frantically darted back and forth. His nervousness was definitely showing now.

"Again. A different maneuver."

Ash looked lost; the complex combination move was more than likely enough to hold any attackers back and allow him room to run away. Ash wasn't taught to battle for the thrill of clashing powers together but for survival, where all rules were cast away in the face of living tomorrow. Fossil knew little other techniques or maneuvers simply because with his strangely prodigious power, he didn't need to. Of course, Bruno didn't settle for survival.

"Ten seconds," Bruno warned. A note of panic entered Ash's gaze. He glanced from side to side, obviously floundering.

Bruno didn't need to command Machamp for him to surge forward with a single fluid motion, aimed towards Fossil. The smaller pokémon froze for a second before loudly screeching at the fast approaching pokémon, spraying a series of small immaterial balls of faint prismatic light in front of him. Machamp snorted at the weak Confuse Ray before he imbued one of his many fists with frozen energy and whipped it sideways. The Ice Punch defense was strong enough to deflect the move into the ground where it was reduced to immaterial dust. Fossil then seemed to panic further, actually audibly squeaking for the first time that Lance had heard him, and dove onto the ground, his shell giving off an uncanny sheen. Machamp gave another grunt before kicking Fossil off of the ground, rendering his Harden ineffective and sending him careening into Ash's arms. The force of the heavy pokémon sent Ash to the ground, where he landed with a solid "OOF!" as his breath was effectively knocked out from him.

Lance winced for Ash. Kabuto weren't exactly light pokémon.

Ash struggled to get up, forcing Fossil's dazed and unconscious form off of himself. He looked up at Bruno with only a touch of fear and a great deal of awe. Bruno, for his part, continued to look on impassively, though an air of satisfaction entered his posture.

"A strong base. Next."

Egg clambered forward without Ash's prompting. The Pikachu was already quivering with excitement, ready to test himself out against the wall of flesh that Machamp was being.

Ash took a determined stance, pointing forcefully as he made a strange buzzing noise with his teeth. Egg gave a cry of affirmation before dashing forward, practically becoming a yellow blur in his haste. The air crackled with some sort of energy and echoed in a faint sonic boom as Egg summoned lightning and leapt onto the ground, sending a weak wave of electricity crackling through the grass. When it touched Machamp, he snorted and stomped his foot to regain the feeling in it. Egg leapt into the air—at his peak, he seemed to somersault before transitioning into a quick spin that whipped his tail, sending a ball of electricity towards Machamp at high speeds. The second that Egg touched down, he started moving again, darting back and forth across the battlefield in an attempt to throw Machamp off. For his part, Machamp simply re-summoned Ice Punch and punched the Electro Ball squarely in its center, releasing the pent-up energy into the air, though he still winced and shook his hand out to regain its feeling. The moment that he did, Egg gave a triumphant cry that Ash echoed and darted forward again, running between his legs just as he summoned a rather weak bolt of electricity down onto Machamp. The fighting-type grimaced as he crouched into a readied squat, eyes subconsciously squinting at the attack.

Lance was suspicious of Machamp's demeanor. The fighting-type in general had a reputation for seeming to be pure muscle, sheer force that was tamed by a trainer. In fact, many trainers treated their fighting-type pokémon as mindless brutes, teaching them to listen for the exact inflections and meanings of their commands. Many a successful human had managed to hone their fighting-types into living reflexes, pokémon that acted before the trainer said anything, an extension of a body part that was summoned to an arena.

However, there was a reason that those trainers were mere trainers and Bruno was Kanto's Fighting Master. Bruno acknowledged that intelligence was not a fighting-type's strength, but he also firmly believed that a fighting-type's strength wasn't in its physical presence, either.

Bruno fully recognized that the fighting-type's strength was in its will, its focus, and its desire for honor and respect from those it considered above them. In recognizing that, Bruno didn't just teach his pokémon how to attack efficiently before he even spoke or how to harness their inner power to devastating consequences. He took it a step further: he taught his pokémon strategy and human instinct, turning his team from a set of reliable pokémon into eerie, uncanny valley creatures that acted as though they were human, though they would just as willingly follow any instructions that Bruno himself gave them. Even in his commands, Bruno focused on pointing out problems and then simply allowed his team to figure out for themselves how to solve them.

Machamp was acting like a pokémon. He wasn't acting like a man.

Suddenly, the massive behemoth _moved_ and though his speed was nowhere near the practically invisible Pikachu's, it was definitely faster than a creature of such bulk should be able to move. Machamp didn't smack Egg away the way he did Fossil; he swiftly slid his leg in an arc, and though it shouldn't have been possible somehow the giant pokémon knew exactly where Egg would be sprinting because the yellow blur that had been charging around the field was suddenly flying through the air with a shriek. Egg crashed onto the ground with a loud huff, not quite unconscious but looking woozy from being punted through the air and slamming down. Ash let out an uncertain yelp, a question hanging in the air. Egg coughed a response back, picking himself up, tail twitching in pain. He shook his head, trying to shake off his dizziness. Machamp just stood patiently, back to standing in the ready stance he was in prior to tripping the Pikachu.

Bruno watched impassively as Egg stood on all fours, shaking from exertion.

"Again. A different maneuver," he repeated.

Ash seemed to wise up to the game now. He trilled sharply, and Egg called back, their voices different pitches in the harmony of battle. Egg blurred out of existence again, this time calling upon an overwhelming wave of electricity before zooming back and forth. He was much more visible now: his form flickered within the shell of light that he conjured, and the crackling wasn't anywhere near loud enough to mask the determined snarls that Egg uttered with every step. Before, Egg tried to be everywhere at once, laying a web of sparks that, when triggered, invited a sudden but weak attack. Now, he was a comet that streaked across the ground, making the grass pop when he stepped on it and leaving behind a trail of smoke.

Machamp grunted and crouched lower. As Egg approached, he shifted his position such that he presented a leg towards the Pikachu. Instinctively, Egg sprinted towards the limb. It made sense: as an extremity, a leg was most likely to buckle under the force that he built up from running about, and it was much easier to paralyze as any insulating fat was in the body itself, especially in a muscled fighting-type like Machamp.

It seemed as though Egg and Ash hadn't learned quite quickly enough.

The second that Egg dashed at Machamp, he subtly shifted his posture. Egg found himself running up Machamp's leg rather than running into it, and the small pokémon froze as he clung to Machamp's shoulder, a half a foot away from the suddenly smirking fighting-type's face. Machamp merely swatted him off of the shoulder as though he were a pesky fly, sending Egg crashing to the floor painfully again.

"Again, a different maneuver."

Without a command from Ash, Egg stood up, snarled, and ran at Machamp again. Recognizing the entire thing as an act of futility, Lance quietly walked around the courtyard and approached Bruno from behind. The Fighting Master gave no indication of noticing that he was there, though Pancham turned and chattered at him quietly.

"You are testing his durability and ingenuity." A statement, not a question. Bruno didn't respond at first, watching Egg dart at and away from Machamp in a violent dance that Machamp was more than willing to perpetuate. He was noticing minute differences in posture, places where Egg gave away his thought process, moments that the Pikachu was broadcasting his intentions as loudly as if Ash was vocally directing every one of his movements—everything that made Egg flawed and a weak opponent to Bruno.

"He is young, still. He can be trained. This is an assessment, not a training session, Dragon Master."

Lance stifled a quiet sigh at the stilted formality of the title. "Regardless, this is a child of war, not of the home. He is used to training but not to a simple test. Be careful, Bruno."

Bruno gave no outward acknowledgement, though his posture did relax slightly as he watched Egg dash at Machamp again, bruised but determined to somehow bring him down. Machamp looked almost bored at this point, though he dutifully slid into a variety of stances to challenge Egg to try something new.

"Enough. Next."

Egg snarled at the implication that he was done before he could defeat Machamp, but before he could do anything Program dove in front of him and made a few static-y noises. The Pikachu stomped away in a huff, plopping down next to Amber with lowered ears, pouting as much as he could (she patted him on the head consolingly).

Program's trained strategy was evidently to confound and disarm opponents, as its main maneuver involved attempting to dive at Machamp's head and make a series of screeches that echoed in Lance's ears long after they faded away. It didn't seem to have any specifically recognizable moves; sometimes it launched what looked like a burst of water that sparked out of reality with a loud crackle while at others it flung tiny bursts of sound that exploded into golden circles that looked like coins. Machamp seemed disturbed by Program itself but focused on diverting its attacks and outright dodging some of them. He refused to move too much, simply ducking or twisting away from the flickers whenever he could. Program's strange make-up meant that Machamp had to improvise much more, but it also meant that whoever had trained Ash and his team didn't have much idea of how to streamline the pixelated mass, and Bruno quickly dismissed it.

Amber stood in front of Machamp, trembling slightly. From Lance's new vantage point by Bruno, he could see the apprehension that ruled in her gaze. It troubled Lance; while most pokémon weren't bloodthirsty per se, they all contained an inordinate amount of pride and thus enjoyed a good battle to see who was the better creature. It wasn't always a straight pokémon battle, as evidenced by the variety of performance-based pokémon tournaments, but that didn't change the fact that most pokémon liked competition. Egg was a prime example of that: the Pikachu hated being taken off of the battlefield without being defeated and was moping about it still, and his movements against Machamp had proven that he loved to test out his ability against those much stronger than himself.

Amber didn't have that excitement; if anything, she seemed afraid to be in battle against Machamp. Her expression would have better fit a little girl who found herself facing the large fighting-type in front of her. She crouched into a ready stance, her legs and arms trembling, paws clenched into fists by her face.

Ash let out a quiet questioning but comforting rumble. Amber cooed back before taking a breath as if to center herself. She put on a determined expression and looked to Machamp, only the slightest quiver left in her posture.

Before Bruno prompted, Ash gave a sharp bark of a sound and Amber leaned back before darting forward at a breakneck speed. She immediately began to glow red, though she started to slow down as she got closer to Machamp. Amber ran through his legs and immediately whipped around, her eyes gleaming in a Foresight. Ash clicked his tongue this time, and Amber summoned what looked like a halo of bluish-gold light around her paw that she slammed into the ground, sending herself into the air. A ball of bluish-white, just a shade different, emanated from her paws—she flicked her wrist and sent the Aura Sphere at Machamp's head before landing heavily, stumbling slightly from the force of the Meteor Mash she harnessed to get to the right height. Amber was panting heavily from the exertion, though she still stood in a crouched ready position.

Machamp didn't look too damaged from the attack, simply annoyed by its complexity. He slammed a foot into the ground, rocking it slightly and setting Amber off balance. As she stumbled, Machamp grunted loudly and flew forward and into the ground, this time smashing into it with two fists that sent shockwaves through the packed earth. As Amber watched in trepidation, cracks ran through the ground before sending up sharp earthen points that threatened to stab into her. She cried out in fear and fell backwards, immediately crawling away from it. Ash let out another commanding squeak that made Amber freeze before getting up, paws glowing with a whitish light now. As one of the points made its way over to Amber, she responded by thrusting the paw out and smashing the very tip of the spire. It didn't stop the Stone Edge at all, though it dulled its point and prevented it from causing anything more than a bruise, especially since Machamp hadn't sent enough power through the attack to do much more than violently prod Amber. Amber made the mistake of staring in horror at the spike in front of her and only looking up when Ash let out an alarmed screech. Machamp's Bullet Punch hit Amber square in the chest and sent her flying backwards, rolling against the ground as she cried out in pain. Shaking, she stood back up.

Lance noticed a strangely fanatic gleam in Ash's eyes. He let out a single sharp noise that Amber stiffened at before relaxing slightly. She looked Machamp in the eyes and maintained eye contact as she carefully crouched down. Machamp grunted and moved as though to Bullet Punch her again, but this time Amber seemed to shimmer slightly and the aftershock of the Bullet Punch resonated in Machamp's arm instead, making him roar in surprised pain and shake his hand out, snarling at his own arrogant foolishness. Amber dropped the Counter, seeming ever more exhausted with every retaliation.

"I've seen enough. Let me give you my judgment."

"What about Mewtwo?" Ash asked, confused.

Bruno's brow furrowed, the first indication all afternoon of some human emotion in the tall man. "I did not think him a battling partner. If he wishes to take part, he is more than welcome to."

Mewtwo nodded almost grimly before floating out to the now partially ruined courtyard arena and hovering with relaxed arms. Machamp looked to Bruno briefly before readying himself again.

Ash didn't have to say anything this time around; Lance watched as his eyes began to glow a sharp light blue, Mewtwo's mirroring them. Their body posture suddenly shifted—Mewtwo relaxed, Ash tensed, and they met at some strange middle where they started to breathe as one. They closed their eyes and shifted their weight forward. Ash let out a breath quietly before looking up to Machamp.

Mewtwo _moved_. He leaned forward and zoomed, hands held up to summon what power he could. Ash held an arm out as though reaching for Machamp, a look of intense concentration on his face, before he closed his fingers into a fist and pulled it back towards himself. Mewtwo continued to hurtle towards Machamp, who snorted and sunk into a more secure position. Just before Mewtwo would have bodily collided into the burlier pokémon, he vanished into the air.

Lance's eyes narrowed as a faint fog began to drift into the air. Machamp struggled to clear it, waving a hand through irritably, but the unnatural Mist proved too strong despite how light of a move it was known to be. Mewtwo reappeared behind Machamp and quickly reached out a hand to touch his upper arm lightly and vanish again. Machamp suddenly looked as though he was straining to use his arm; the muscles twitched and shook with exertion, and he opened and closed his fist to flex his fingers. Nevertheless, the Disable proved too weak to hold back Machamp for long and he shook it off with a savage grunt. Mewtwo had already vanished back into the Mist, though Machamp didn't seem too worried. The four-armed creature grunted, twisting quickly to his right just as Mewtwo appeared with an arm outstretched, hand where Machamp's shoulder used to be. Lance could only see Mewtwo's eyes widen slightly before Machamp reached over and grabbed his wrist quickly. Mewtwo's eyes glowed lilac for a split second before the light clustered in front of him and pulsed outwards. Machamp grunted in irritation but wasn't deterred in reaching out with his other three arms and restraining Mewtwo forcefully. Mewtwo began to physically struggle, the faint blue glow in his eyes wavering as he began to visibly panic. He managed to force an arm just far enough to flex his hands and summon a strange shimmering orb that flew towards Machamp's head, Teleporting away when Machamp's arms loosened ever so slightly in his distraction.

A smirk stretched across Machamp's face, and he turned to sneer at where Mewtwo must have disappeared to. He coughed out what could have been a laugh and squatted back down. He deliberately closed his eyes and stood, limbs outstretched and tense, hands beginning to glow faintly white. Lance noticed that his eyes had opened into mere slits that gave off an intangible power as well. Machamp's eyes darted back and forth, calculating everything that he could see, but he still did not move.

Mewtwo had vanished but evidently grew nervous at Machamp's lack of movement, as he soon reappeared right behind where Machamp was looking. Lance caught one last glimpse of Machamp's knowing, smug smirk before he _moved_. His heel shifted, his fists slammed into the ground, and his body quickly slid to the right.

The earth rippled.

There must have been some indication to Machamp that Mewtwo could not be defeated by a simple trick or by exploiting an instinct. The other pokémon, as substantial or insubstantial as the case might have been, remained their primal selves. No matter how humanoid Amber acted at times or how similar Ash and Egg seemed, the Riolu and Pikachu were still simple pokémon that obeyed whatever survival instinct written into them. Mewtwo was different—analytical, thoughtful, patient in many ways that Ash was not. Mewtwo did not obey instinct but actively questioned them, working to find the correct answer no matter how twisted it seemed.

Mewtwo acted as Machamp was trained to act, and so would Machamp treat him.

Stones pierced the ground, forged from the packed dirt into spires that relentlessly shot towards Mewtwo. The pokémon tried to Teleport away again but Machamp simply redirected his focus to where Mewtwo shimmered into being. The pointed rock was ramming out of the earth's surface as Mewtwo materialized, its tips just blunted enough to avoid piercing Mewtwo's flesh but sharp enough to prod him at various points on his back and arms.

Mewtwo collapsed, his eyes wide in panic. He closed his eyes, concentrating, but they soon flew open again, this time in disbelief. The pale blue glow in his eyes began to dim; Ash called out sharply when he lost connection to Mewtwo.

Machamp gave a huff before slamming his foot onto the ground again. The Stone Edge spires withdrew into the ground in a single smooth motion, leaving behind no trace other than a quiet rumble.

"Very good, Ash. You show great skill." Bruno gave him a brusque nod as though to emphasize his words and walked forward with Machamp to stand in front of him.

Ash shrank away from Bruno's approaching form. The boy looked almost bitter in his fear. "I lost," he said plainly.

"Of course. There would have been no other course. My brothers-in-arms have trained with me since they and I were both young. I have spent many, many years with them to hone their skills. You have merely scratched the surface of your own siblings' talent. You will one day eclipse us all, young Master-to-be."

Lance narrowed his eyes at Bruno's declaration. The Fighting Master did not say such words lightly. For him to call Ash a Master-to-be was, for all intents and purposes, a call to action for Ash himself.

Of course, there was no way for Ash to know this. He was simply a child, too young for him to truly comprehend or undergo this sort of training, and all that he knew was that he had been challenged by a man and that all of his friends lost to a single comrade of his. All that he knew was that Bruno was strong and that he was weak.

"How do I get as good as you?" Ash asked.

Bruno gave him the subtlest of smiles. "You train. And, for now, you train with me."

Lance took that as his cue to leave.

* * *

It grew harder to find Ash in his rooms. More often, he would be training with his pokémon or at lessons with Lorelei. Bruno was a less regular taskmaster than the Ice Master, who insisted on devoting four hours each morning to Ash's schooling. The boy did not know of the peace of weekends as other schoolchildren might, though he did not know of the bores of homework as Lorelei simply didn't have the time to grade any additional work of his. Bruno somehow always knew when Ash would need his help but otherwise encouraged him to discover himself in his training and only come to the Fighting Master when he had questions or wanted advice on a specific technique.

Lance shared meals with him, and while it seemed so small, the Dragon Master also saw that the faux independence allowed Ash to flourish. He would faithfully knock at the office door, shadowed as always by Mewtwo, and Lance would discuss whatever happened that day with him. Dinners began almost silent. Lance wasn't a particularly talkative man, and Ash still lived in some rigid quiet that forced itself upon the boy's shoulders. It wasn't a perfect cage; Ash was still a small child who found himself filled with exuberant, blind excitement that overpowered even the strongest urge to stay still, though he managed to fight it out of sheer will for a surprisingly long time.

It took him three weeks to crack. That day at dinner, Ash bounced into the office, Mewtwo almost exasperatedly trailing him. Lance was pleasantly surprised at his good mood and joined the boy and his living shadow at the table.

"She did so well, Mister Lance!" Ash said in a chipper voice. "Aura's always been a bit tricky, 'specially because Mister Bruno says that she has too much power and not enough control—" [Lance took a note of that, quickly puzzling out some possible solutions if he were asked to provide any] "—so we've been working on making it so that she can still use Aura without tiring herself out too much. Mister Bruno talked about how Aura could be used as a way to overwell another pokémon—"

" _Overwhelm-overwhelm-overcome"_ echoed through Lance's mind, a distinct voice speaking through the typical resonating feelings that marked his telepathy [Lance noted this to relay to Sabrina]. Mewtwo blinked innocently at Ash and hovered his chopsticks of noodles up to his mouth.

Ash looked irritated at Mewtwo's interruption but shrugged it off just as quickly. "O-ver-whelm. That. But anyways, Aura can be used for so many things! And we're working on it in Amber—we're trying a skill where she can make an Aura Mist and be in touch with everything that touches it! For now we've been trying to get the Aura to not just be in a ball—the only thing that we've been able to do is summon it into a very fuzzy ball? Mister Bruno has been talking about so many possible things and it's a bit confusing but I think I get it and we can get it to work soon, even without knowing what he's saying—"

This time, Ash didn't get cut off by anything other than a sharp glance from Mewtwo. Lance found himself confused until he noticed how startled and panicked Ash looked. His eyes were trained onto his plate, his hand was clenched around his chopsticks, he was frozen. Mewtwo was equally frozen, though his gaze was trained onto Lance instead. He was observing, watching, waiting for Lance's reaction to… something.

"You should be free to call us by just our names, Ash," Lance said calmly. "You've been living here long enough for that, and anyone who doesn't know you would be confused why you aren't referring to us as Masters instead. Could you keep talking about what you've got planned for this technique, or is it a secret from me?"

Lance watched as Ash slowly looked back up, his eyes wide and shining. After a couple of seconds, a smile once again began to stretch across his face. He started to babble about the move he was planning (the current iteration was that Amber was hitting the Aura Spheres that she summoned with a protected hand, exploding the Aura outside of the stable ball, though the problem was that she had an equal tendency to accidentally dissipate the Aura altogether). Lance glanced back towards Mewtwo, who had relaxed ever so slightly and was cautiously eating the noodles again.

Somehow, Lance understood that he passed an unspoken test.

* * *

There was always paperwork to be done. Why was there always paperwork to be done?

Intellectually, Lance knew the answer. The other Kanto Masters were on their way for their expected meeting, and they were required to send in their updates before they arrived to let meetings run more smoothly. Some Masters always forgot to send them in (Lance was still waiting on Daisy and Erika, though he honestly wasn't expecting theirs to arrive at all) but most made an effort to as the less time they spent on business, the more time they could spend catching up or sparring.

The meetings were, after all, the only times that any Master could truly go all out, and any time taken from that to have to do paperwork was unwanted.

However, that meant that Lance had to do almost seventeen times the amount of work that he would have done as a non-Champion Master.

It was annoying, to say the least.

A piece of paper poked Lance's arm. The man rubbed his eyes quickly, put down the latest sheet, and turned to his volunteer helper with a smile.

Ash had an uncharacteristically serious expression as he stood there, the offending piece of paper in his hand.

"This is the last one," he said solemnly.

"Is it? Who is it from, then?" Lance asked, taking the paper and glancing over it.

"Bock."

"Brock?" Lance looked at it more carefully now. "Huh. I guess he technically is the Rock Master now. I don't know why that didn't occur to me."

"Isn't he a kid?" Mewtwo perked up at that from the sheet he was perusing (apparently Duplica acquired another Ditto from somewhere and requested permission to train it. Lance had no idea why she stuck to that particular old rule, but he found himself approving her requests himself more often than not).

"Under the law, he isn't, and he's been training under his father since he was much younger than you are now. But yes, he is around twelve, so he's on the younger side of the Masters."

"Huh." Ash stood a bit awkwardly next to Lance's desk instead of going back to his work reorganizing the jumbled mess that had been moved to the ground.

"Is there something wrong?"

"When will he be here?"

Lance blinked and took a moment to think it over. "Brock likes to come a bit early, to get his pokémon more situated, since they're on the feistier side. He will most likely arrive sometime in the next four or five days, given that the meeting is next week." He paused to glance Ash over. "Would you like to meet him?"

The same shining eyes that silently answered Lance's question greeted Brock that Wednesday.

"Oh. Uh, hi," the Rock Master said, waving his hand awkwardly at Ash. After quickly peeking at Lance, Brock cautiously held out a hand and patted Ash on the head. "You're just as old as Forrest is, huh?"

"Aren't forests usually really, really old?" Ash chirped, cocking his head to the side out of confusion.

Brock took his breath as though to explain further what he meant but evidently decided it wasn't worth it and just waved his comment away. "And who's this?" Brock asked, turning to Mewtwo, who stood awkwardly to Ash's side.

"This is Mewtwo, Ash's closest companion," Lance said. "He's a bit… uncertain around others, but he is loyal and as clever as any of us." He ignored the quiet stream of _"loyal?-pet-child-lesser equal-my-I-me-not"_ that Mewtwo began to grumble into his mind.

"Oh. Huh. Well, nice to meet you too, Mewtwo," Brock said, holding his hand out to the pokémon. Mewtwo looked at it uncertainly, glanced up back to Lance, and finally reached out a finger and touched it to the offered hand. After a moment or two, Brock simply nodded and took his hand away, turning back to Lance.

"Do I have the same accommodations for my team as last time?" he asked.

"I'm assuming that your needs haven't changed too much over the course of three months," Lance said. "The arena and stables are yours to use at your discretion.

Brock snorted lightly. "Yeah, nothing too much has changed. Still trying to work with Rhydon not to knock me unconscious every time we have to go to the Pokémon Center, but I'm starting to think he's doing it on purpose."

Lance stifled a grin at the reminder of Brock's strange impulse to flirt with the various women he met. Puberty hit hard, it seemed. "How strange. Perhaps I can work with him as well."

Brock gave him a hard look through almost-closed eyes. "Are you messing with me?"

"Not at all, Master Brock," Lance said.

"Of course. How silly of me to think so." Brock headed for the door, shouldering his backpack once more. The twelve Pokéballs he was allowed to carry were quickly covered back up by his vest. "I'll go put my stuff down and then let them out. And maybe you can actually help me with Aerodactyl? She's been a bit flighty these days."

"Of course," Lance parroted Brock. "I'll leave you to it. Ash, do you want to stay with Brock or go to your team?"

Ash looked up at Brock with an obvious expression of admiration. Lance couldn't hold _that_ smile back.

"I'll be in my office, working out where the other Masters can keep their teams. You'd think that we'd get this organized before now each time, but it remains a responsibility."

Brock shrugged. "I don't have that many suggestions; I'm not a good example of a Master in growing his team."

Lance nodded to him once more and left without a good-bye. He could hear Ash scurrying after Brock, still scrounging up the courage to start asking him questions. Mewtwo imparted a last feeling of _"uncertain-maybe-maybe fine-we'll-be-fine maybe?-maybe fine?-fine?"_ before most likely hovering after him.

The Dragon Master was asked to go to the Arena meant to house Brock's team thankfully after he managed to finish off his mountain of paperwork. He deftly returned the two team members stretched out in his office –Altaria gave a single note of passive acquiescence before allowing himself to be turned to red light– and made his way over.

The League was winding hallways and false doors, but after so many years of navigating it, the path had sunk so deeply into his muscle memory that even in moments of confusion Lance knew where to go. Soon he got to a wide, circular space within the building complete with an arching ceiling that curved stories above his head. Brock and Ash looked small in the center of it, even if they weren't surrounded by some members of Brock's team. In a moment of ostentatious indulgence, Lance quietly released one of his Dragonite (his first brother, the one that started with him at the very beginning) and mounted him. Drakon let out a loud screech as he ascended just high enough to beat his wings once and screaming into the air with a loud _CRACK!_

Drakon screamed out again, a cry of jubilance and reckless abandon, as he allowed himself to go at full-speed, wrapping his body in a bubble of Protect so that Lance's skin didn't flay off of his face from the sheer velocity, whipping around the arena twice in a handful of seconds and twisting into the air to hover slightly. Lance looked down from his perch (Drakon had, as usual, flown to the very top of the vaulted ceiling in his delight) and saw Brock, Mewtwo, and Ash staring up at him.

Lance hoped that Ash would forgive him for the fright of his next trick. He closed his eyes, whispered to Drakon (who was already expecting the stunt and had most likely already mentally prepared).

And then he leaned backwards and fell right off of Drakon's back.

Brock made no noise but Ash's shriek [of fear? exhilaration? shock?] was audible from Lance's height. He heard the undercurrent of _"no-wait-no stop-stop-stop stop-stop-can't no-don't-don't"_ begin to pound into his mind, and as he watched the ground speed up to get to him, he shouted out a single command.

"Aftershock, version 3 for flight!"

Drakon screamed out again before racing downwards and shooting out a glowing ball of compressed power that trailed through the air a little bit before imploding with a quiet _boom!_ and letting out a much weaker wave of energy that hit Lance and sent him spiraling backwards and into a somersault. Lance felt Drakon swoop underneath him and leaned down for the Dragonite to pause slightly and let him land on his back before gently flying to the ground and allowing Lance to calmly leap off of his back, patting his partner in thanks.

"Hello, boys," he said with a wide grin. Drakon smiled toothily as well, a crooked, sharp smile of fangs and wicked intent. It was fascinating how teachers chose Dragonite of all of the dragon-types to portray as the approachable species. Numerous teaching diagrams showed the golden dragons as rounded, chubbier, with large approachable eyes, and though Lance could definitely see how such images could have been drawn, nothing had ever felt so contrary. Dragonite were fierce protectors and frequently their thick golden scales hid a wiry musculature and a pair of wings large enough to bend the air around them to their whims. They were kind to children of any species, perhaps out of some strange sense of obligation, but they were as cunning and ruthless as a Salamence or Garchomp in its prime.

Perhaps it was this that explained why Lance was greeted with a complete stillness after his dismount. Brock looked like he would have rolled his eyes if it would have made any effect. Ash looked shell-shocked.

After a couple of seconds of complete silence, a wide grin began to spread across Ash's face.

"Wow," he whispered.

Lance gave him a wink before addressing Brock. "What was that about your Aerodactyl, then?"

Brock sighed. "You'll give her ideas, and she's already so hard to keep under control," he said. Brock's Pupitar scoffed, though it seemed to be almost in agreement. His Golem grunted and the off-color Geodude that shimmered with every movement on her back made an equally nervous grumble. An Onix, dark with age, curled himself up behind Brock, distrustful eyes set on the Pokéball that Brock clipped from his belt and fiddled with.

He sighed in resignation before flicking his wrist down, expanding the Pokéball as part of the movement of his hands. The device bounced on the ground once and obediently opened from the trigger, releasing a purple winged creature that shrieked her glee at freedom before looping through the air, flapping her wings as she darted higher and higher.

"Aerodactyl! I know you want to play, but now's not the time. Get down here!" Aerodactyl looked vaguely mutinous at the suggestion.

Lance wordlessly released his own.

It was easy to distinguish which trainer led which Aerodactyl, despite their overall physical similarities. Brock's was much more heavy-set, her skin rugged to the eye and she flapped her wings as she looked down at Lance's with some interest. Lance's partner was sleeker, perhaps a bit brighter purple in hue from the grey beast that Brock commanded, with a dangerous gleam and a glide to his flight. He snarled at the Aerodactyl that had the audacity to fly above him, a deadly pride challenging the steadfast stubbornness he showed as he perched beside his trainer. Lance clicked his tongue at his Aerodactyl, who looked at him contritely before snarling quietly up at the other once more.

Brock looked on ruefully. "I don't think she respects me enough for that," he said finally, gesturing at Lance's Aerodactyl's behavior. Lance looked over to him and finally began to recognize the crestfallen thirteen-year-old boy and not see the infallible Rock Master that Brock had forced himself to become.

"Perhaps she doesn't. You're still a child to her and it'll be like that for a while. It's not too well-known, but Aerodactyl were rather social creatures back before they were mostly reanimated fossils. Flocks of close to fifty of them at a time would nest together and take care of their young, protect them from other predators. It could simply be that your Aerodactyl thinks of you as her child and wants to protect you more than she wants to listen to you. I wouldn't recommend twisting that to your advantage; pokémon are clever enough to recognize those kinds of ploys, and she most likely wouldn't forgive you that. However, if you are open to her about what it is you want and how that will benefit both of you equally—as well as the rest of your flock—" Lance gestured to the part of Brock's team that had been released "—then I'm sure she'll become much easier to handle."

Brock looked pensive. "I see."

"M-Lance?" Ash spoke up then; both Brock and Lance had all but forgotten that he was also present. "What's a flock?"

Brock answered that one. "It's a group of flying-type pokémon, typically the kind that are referred to as birds. Aerodactyl is a part of its own scientific family so it tends to get the same title."

"Why would they be in a group? Murkrow don't like being in groups."

Brock looked rather confused. "Well, groups of Murkrow are sometimes known as murders, but I've never heard of Murkrows being solitary. They're just as sociable as other pokémon, perhaps even more so thanks to their penchant for intelligence."

"What's a penchant?"

Lance watched as Brock dug himself deeper and deeper in to the question hole, though he didn't seem to mind as he just casually kept releasing his team (a squealing Omastar, a roaring Rhydon, a Bonsly that hopped back and forth between its legs before plopping down into a sitting position) as he answered the stream of questions that Ash unleashed on him. When Brock released his final two team members, a freshly revived Cranidos that pawed nervously at the ground and a Kabuto that scuttled around with no fear, Ash looked at the latter with awe.

"You have a Fossil too?" he asked.

Brock understandably misunderstood. "Well, I've got more than one, but yeah, I find them a lot of fun to work with. They're tricky little guys, what with their primitive mindsets, but that also makes them more loyal and willing to go all the way with you." Brock reached down and soothed Cranidos with a pat on the head. "Honestly, I wouldn't give them up for the entire world."

"And you let them go wherever they want? Then why use Pokéballs?" Ash seemed so curious.

Brock gave him a strange half-smile before answering. "The world is built for humans, and unfortunately for my team, that means that very few of them fit in. The fossils, as much as I love them, are so easily overwhelmed by city lights, and I can't very well bring Onix or Rhydon with me into a city."

The low grumbles from either pokémon proved that they begged to differ.

"Keeping them in Pokéballs means that they get to stay with me wherever they want to be and that they're always with me and ready for me to call on them. If I didn't keep them in Pokéballs, then they'd have to stay behind at the Gym, and as much as they love it there, they'd get bored and unhappy pretty easily. It's better for them to be with me, where I can make sure to give them fresh air every day and train them where I know they won't destroy Pewter City. Does that make sense?"

Ash's furious nodding relaxed something within Lance that he didn't realize had tensed up at Ash's question. Perhaps introducing him to the older boy was a good move after all.

And then, of course, one of the various Ace Trainers walked into the arena to let Lance know that they had finished setting up a small moat for Brock's Relicanth. At the sight of the woman, Brock began to babble mindlessly until Rhydon swiftly clocked him in the back of the head, sending him sprawling at the ground much to Ash's confusion. Pupitar just sighed heavily as Golem carefully got Geodude off of her back and lifted Brock there instead to walk him over to a wall.

Ash just cocked his head in confusion. Lance hid his smile behind a fist and thanked the Ace Trainer for letting him know, dismissing her without another word.

* * *

 **It's been a while, much apologies. I've been working my two jobs, trying to keep up in school, and preparing for graduation in three months. The story is developing beautifully in the shelter of my mind; now I just need time to write it out for you. I would have included the annual meeting in this chapter, but this upload is long overdue and that can definitely wait until next time. I don't quite have the time to reply to reviews as often as I used to, but if you have a very pressing question I'll be sure to answer it however I can.**


	4. The Masters

The other Masters slowly gathered in the League over the course of the next few days in preparation for the official meetings. Lance didn't oversee all of their move-ins—Brock had been a special case both because of his age and his request for advice—but he only needed to walk through the hallway and feel the latent ozone in the air that crackled across his cloak, smell the cloying perfume that drifted from under another door, breathe in the heavy and humid air that immediately felt unerringly dry against his skin to know that his fellows had arrived. No walls could contain the exuding auras of the Masters, no matter how much money the government threw at a building, especially if they were accompanied by their prized partners at all times, as he expected they would be.

Despite his excitement at meeting Brock, Ash slowly began to withdraw from the League building at large as more Masters arrived. An influx of Masters from South Kanto coincided with Ash refusing to leave his room, and no amount of gentle questioning to him or Mewtwo would reveal anything other than an undercurrent of nervous energy that Lance was hard-pressed to ignore. Even the promise of another playmate didn't convince Ash to leave his haven, and Lance was reluctant to invade it with strangers if he had already decided that he didn't want to be social.

When Lance mentioned these odd tendencies offhand to Brock, the Rock Master almost seamlessly incorporated visiting Ash into his settling-in schedule. Accompanied by his diligent Golem partner, her shiny ward, and his current project of a Pupitar, Brock became a popular figure in Ash's room, and he was more than happy to come talk to the younger boy. Lance wondered if Brock was as intrigued by Ash as Ash seemed to be him or if his interest was based in nostalgia for the gaggle of siblings he left at home when visiting the League.

The day before all of the Masters were expected to be present (and, true to her nature, Green was dragging her heels in arriving), Lance knocked on Ash's door to find the room empty. Perhaps another man would have panicked, but he simply released Deino from her Pokéball and bid her to track the boys down. She led him down the halls into a usually unused training arena, where Lance could feel the slight trembling of the earth and hear halfhearted cracks.

Ash had somehow convinced Brock to let him watch the older boy train, and Brock's protective nature had led him to command his team to underperform. There was a distinct boredom in Rhydon's eyes as he flailed his arms loosely at a rock spire that Brock's Golem had manifested, but even that was enough to send small shockwaves through the earth that made Ash tremble from behind the barrier that Mewtwo had put up. Egg, Amber, and Fossil were hovering in bubbles of Mewtwo's making, chasing each other through the air with bursts of energy. Program was floating around them, as usual.

"What's happening here?" Lance asked as he walked in, undisturbed by the occasional tremors.

"I'm trying to see if I can get Rhydon to use Hammer Arm in a slightly more versatile way," Brock responded. "It's a bit hard to try and convey the message, though, especially when he's not able to go all out like he wants to."

Rhydon's glance towards Brock spoke of disbelief and resignation.

"How about this," Lance said. He lightly trailed a finger over his own team's Pokéballs and settled on one, clicking it off of his belt and activating it. A flash of light revealed a strangely serpentine form with paper-thin diamond-shaped wings. The Flygon trilled in her throat, curving a long neck down to look at the smaller humans curiously.

"Flygon, if you would take Ash up and away from the ground, please," he asked, hands still moving around his team as he considered who else to ask for help. She gave a cry of agreement before swinging a glowing tail down and effortlessly breaking Mewtwo's barrier. The Psychic stumbled at the sudden disconnect before turning to give Flygon a glare, but she had already scooped Ash up, placed him carefully on her back, and flown into the air. Mewtwo projected annoyance and indignity to all who could hear before hovering up to join them, directing the bubbles of Pokémon to follow behind him. During it all, Lance had released two more of his team members. The two golden-scaled dragons that flickered into being must have been of the same species but were very visibly of different lineage, as the first shook off the stasis with a snarl curling from her angular snout and the second stretched out a pair of feathered wings as he cracked out a crick in his neck.

"Wyvern, to me. Coatl, you're in charge of Brock; follow his lead whenever you can."

The feathered Dragonite trilled before plopping down onto all fours and offering his back for Brock to climb onto. The more feral-looking Dragonite did nothing of the sort for Lance, grabbing him by the back of the cape, throwing him onto her back, and taking off with a single swift movement.

After all of the humans were safely in the air, Lance looked to Brock. "Well?" he prompted.

Brock looked much more at ease now that everyone was guaranteed to be safe. After leaning over and asking for permission from Coatl, Brock released his two other Geodude to watch training. He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted down at the team members he had left on the ground. "Aida, Stone Spires! Get them moving at eighty percent to start, be prepared to speed up to max!"

The Golem crooned with excitement before she slid a foot over the plain ground. Jagged fingers made of rock suddenly burst from the ground, practically swimming through the packed earth towards Rhydon. The horned Pokémon gave a snort of anticipation, crouching fluidly into a ready position and leaping to one side before one of the Spires could ram into him. Rhydon snarled at Aida, who simply smirked and shook herself out, her rocky scales glimmering for a split second, before snickering at Rhydon. The behemoth glared at the megaton for a brief moment before he had to dodge another tower of rock that hurtled towards him.

"Rhydon! Hammer Arm, forty-five seconds! Aida, keep up the Spires; don't introduce anything more yet!" Brock called down. Lance felt a mental brush that fed him confusion and curiosity and merely shook his head to Mewtwo, attempting to convey patience to him. Flygon darted up by Wyvern, who snapped at her briefly before being chastened by the pat to her head from her rider-Trainer. Ash voiced Mewtwo's question to Lance out loud; he told the boy to be patient as well.

Now the two wore parallel expressions of impatience and rebellion.

Meanwhile, Rhydon had been weaving through the set of Stone Spires, speeding up as Aida commanded the ground to accelerate. He didn't target the Spires specifically, choosing to obliterate the ones that came straight for him and couldn't be dodged. Aida didn't change her tactics at all, merely making up for the smaller number of Spires she had to command by sending them flying through the earth at breakneck speeds.

When it got down to five rock formations, Rhydon began to hunt the Spires down in earnest. Aida must have reached her maximum speed because, while she wasn't visibly tired, she had tensed up and was concentrating fully on running circles around Rhydon rather than targeting him with the Spires and then making him chase them as she had been. Rhydon darted around the arena with a speed that should have been impossible for him— Lance had a feeling that Brock had somehow weaponized the bursts of energy that attacks like Fury Attack gave to horned Pokémon—and tore into the rock as though they were made of paper. The last burst of energy resulted in a loud boom that echoed in the arena. When the dust settled, Lance could see Aida deactivating a Protect bubble that surrounded her left arm. Cracks ran through it; Rhydon had managed to damage the summoned armor with his sheer power.

"Well done training them, Brock," Lance said in the deafening silence. With the stillness broken, Ash started whooping on Flygon's back and Rhydon gave Aida a grunt of respect that she returned.

Brock leaned over Coatl's back to give his team a critical look before sighing quietly. "That only barely cut it. Rhydon needs to refine Fury Dash a bit more so that he can phase into it more quickly, and Aida's still taking it pretty easy on him, waiting for him to get rid of most of them before making him run after them. She's only just adapted the shockwaves that Bulldoze makes to be able to direct specific Spires, and from there it's been easy to add additional Spires. We're working on additional layers of Rock Blast and Gyro Ball in there, but that might be too much for her to handle."

"That is a lot of moving parts," Lance said, "though the idea of a cloud of attacks, while not particularly original, is always a good advanced staple. Each of my Dragonite have their own unique blend, as well as most of my other team members. What was Rhydon doing, exactly?" He gestured for Coatl, Wyvern, and Flygon to land.

Brock sighed much more loudly now. "Besides Fury Dash? We're working on the stamina and strength of his Hammer Arm as well as seeing if he can finesse it from just a blunt hit. Might seem like a weird thing to do with a Rock-type, but if Rhydon can get this move down it opens up possibilities for learning elemental moves and being able to include those in already-established techniques." They had touched down now. Ash, as quiet as he had been in the descent, was running up to them now, tailed by Mewtwo.

"How did the rocks swim?" he asked first, practically bouncing with excitement.

"They're technically based in Stone Edge, though Aida breaks them off to control them with Stealth Rock. Some of them aren't actually real and are based in Double Team to try and make the opponent panic more with less energy, and the ones that are physical are moved with a refined Bulldoze. Aida didn't use any of the Double Team ones this time, from what I could tell, so you can imagine just how much mayhem twice as many spires could cause," Brock listed off. It was one of his most complicated tricks, and Lance was impressed by how much it had evolved from the basic Stone Edge-Stealth Rock combo that it started as. Brock had once just wanted a more robust entry hazard; Lance wondered briefly what had inspired him to make it mobile.

Ash seemed lost. "Stone Edge?"

"It's one of the more powerful Rock-type moves," Brock said, apparently unaffected by Ash's confusion. "In its best form, a Pokémon can summon rings of stones around itself that are then thrown into the enemy. They're refined from the Pokémon's actual Aura, so their power is based on the Rock-type energy from the Pokémon's energy levels rather than the surroundings like some other moves are."

"Why not just use that move, if it's so strong?"

Brock took a moment to think on this. "The moves that we throw out as expected are the basic level of Pokémon mastery," he said. "They're not strictly the limit of a Pokémon's power. They're techniques that all examples of that species can use. There are very few Golem with the experience and power necessary to maintain Stone Spires"—Aida visibly preened under her beloved Trainer's praise—"and it's both a display of pride for her to be able to pull it off, as well as a strong technique that other Trainers can't be expected to counter easily simply because they most likely haven't seen anything like it before."

"So, what about him?" Ash had to point at Rhydon to get Brock to understand what he was asking.

"Rhydon wasn't doing anything too big," he responded. "He's just using Hammer Arm. Usually, the Pokémon powers up its entire arm and just tries to hit with whatever part of it they can. This requires the entire arm to be powered up to the same degree. Rhydon's working on a version of this move that focuses all of that power to one part of the arm; it's both an attack exercise and a finesse exercise. If he can fully master learning how to localize that kind of energy, then the move pool that Rhydon can learn from increases exponentially." Brock looked over Rhydon critically. "He's almost there. It's just this and Earth Power and then I think Rhydon might be able to consider evolving. I want him to have a mastery of every possible basic technique of his line before getting to that next step."

Rhydon snorted at his Trainer. Brock smiled in response. "It's been a long journey, hasn't it bud?" Rhydon nodded earnestly.

Ash cocked his head sideways. "Why not start that right now?"

Brock scratched the back of his head. "We have, a little bit, but it's extremely complicated if you don't have the control needed to manifest that kind of power."

"He has the power, though?"

"They both do." Brock nodded to where Aida and Rhydon were standing. "They were some of my first, and maybe because of that they are much more in tune to what I demand of them. I've only got one other team member that could try and be a match for these two."

Ash didn't even ask this time. He just gave Brock a beseeching look. The older boy made the mistake of looking him in the eye before sighing good-naturedly and silently releasing the final member of his main trio, tossing the Pokéball as high into the air as he could.

The burst of red light from the capsule quickly expanded and extended into the dark Onix that Brock had with him previously, who roared the second his vocal cords allowed him to. Rather than collapsing to the ground with a heavy thud, Onix somehow twisted into the air, landing surprisingly softly in a ready-attack position. The serpent's segmented body shifted in the sand as he almost instinctually flickered his body into a glossy shine. After the post-release ritual, Onix turned to the humans and ducked his head down in a deep bow to Brock.

"Onix was already older when I found him," Brock said lovingly, looking to the massive Pokémon before him. "No one expects him to be quite as agile as he is, maybe because of the rock. We're working on making him the swiftest he can be before evolving, if he wants to evolve at all, since the addition of the armor would make such exercises difficult." Onix gave a deep, unhappy bray that echoed somewhere between the boulders of his body at the idea of losing his speed.

"He's looking magnificent, Brock," Lance said, casting a critical eye over the Rock Snake. Onix didn't quite preen under his gaze, but he did give an appreciative rumble. "I'm not surprised that Flint conceded Mastership to you so quickly, if you were able to command an Onix of that caliber at your age."

Brock stiffened slightly. "Well, Dad probably appreciated being released from his duties on top of that," he said evenly as he reached a hand out to Onix. The Rock Snake Pokémon bumped the hand gently with his head. Lance dropped the subject immediately.

"Actually, Onix has a combo move that combines Stone Edge and Stealth Rock as well," Brock said thoughtfully. "It's very different from Stone Spires, since Aida has a very different fighting style from Onix, but it's still based in the same move set. Do you think you could give me some tips on it?"

Ash nodded vigorously, Mewtwo looking just as expectant. Lance merely leaned back slightly with his arms crossed.

"Onix! Pleochroia! Keep it close and dense!" Brock called out.

Onix gave a vicious Roar that made even Wyvern flinch for a split second before she shook it off with a disgusted growl. The stone serpent flexed into an ouroboros of boulders before beginning to spin rapidly. He began to exude a light blue glow that immediately solidified into small chips of rock that spun in the opposite direction. Some of them flickered out of the halo, planting into the ground around him, but a majority of them hovered around Onix's gyrating form. Onix suddenly snapped out of the repetitive swirling into his ready form again, the rocks around him continuing to orbit him like a cloud of asteroids. Onix gave another bellow that sang out his triumph and power. He coiled into a ready position: his head angled towards the ground and the base of his body wrapped into a spring prepared to leap.

"Very impressive combination, Brock. This move is far more based in Stone Edge than Stone Spires was, but it maintains the same level of discipline that you demand in Aida's combination move," Lance spoke almost absent-mindedly, voicing his immediate observations without thinking too hard about them. He walked around the cloud of Pleochroia to examine it more closely, knowing that he was missing some element and almost hoping that he didn't understand what it was. "I'd like to see the two of them spar one day, or even all three of your first few members of your team. It might provide some insight to their instincts and give you more ideas on further training for them."

' _Make-move-move-rock-rock-burst-protect-shield-protect-rock?'_ Brock didn't seem to sense Mewtwo's train of thoughts, and after a moment of no response, Ash vocalized it to him.

"Pleochroia wasn't designed as a defense, as much as it looks like it," Brock said. "It's more of a long-delay offensive maneuver that Onix can set up and use as he wants. After the crystals have formed around him, he can throw out as many or as few as he wants. It's a controlled version of Stone Edge, boosted by the stickiness that Stealth Rock gives." Brock smirked; it was an odd expression to see on his face, filled with a pride that bordered on arrogance as he gazed upon the leviathan that he commanded, surrounded by a bubble of rock that hadn't wavered even in the minutes since he had summoned it. "There are few Onix that can master Stone Edge to this capacity without evolving into Steelix, and even fewer with this level of control. Most others would develop something like this as a shield, like you assumed. Only the best can learn to combine techniques like these after years of growth and training. You have to develop these kinds of techniques to earn your Mastery, and Onix was how I proved myself. He's gotten even better since then. I couldn't be happier with him."

"How do you come up with techniques like that?" Ash was almost vibrating at the thought, despite the fact that Egg had once displayed a similar prowess.

Brock gave Onix a hand signal. Upon seeing the cue, Onix dropped Pleochroia. The rocks rained onto the ground with a loud rumble; Onix shook himself off, relaxing into a coil on the ground, slithering over to Brock almost lazily.

"Instead of trying to explain it, why don't I show you how we develop them?" Brock proposed. Lance raised an eyebrow at that suggestion. The Rock Master shrugged at him. "Maybe Ash'll give me some ideas; you never know. Forrest was adamant about making Stone Spires move."

"Wisdom in the mouth of babes and all of that?" Lance joked. Brock just chuckled in response.

"Ash, if you have any ideas of moves to try and add to whatever you saw today, let me know," Brock said.

Ash must have picked up on the conversation because he was regarding Aida and Rhydon with a strangely keen look.

"Can he…" Ash stomped his legs around before looking up to Rhydon and chirping at him. The Pokémon looked thunderstruck at being directly spoken to by a human but simply responded by Stomping a foot down, sending tremors through the ground. After the Stomp, he looked to Ash expectantly. The child shook his head and stomped around again. Rhydon looked confused but gave two Stomps this time. Ash didn't look appeased yet and turned to his own team, who darted over to him and chattered to each other for a second. Lance wasn't too sure what was happening.

And then he was immediately sure.

Egg started darting around, his calls starting to sound strident and almost jeering. Amber cooed with a similar tone, though she didn't leap forward with him. Fossil didn't say anything, merely scuttling forward with a burst of speed more befitting his evolved form. Program stayed by Ash, almost curled up around his neck, as did Mewtwo.

Aida rolled away to stand by a confused Brock, and the two Geodude that he had observing the spar hopped onto her back. Rhydon seemed faintly amused to start with, grunting back good-naturedly and occasionally holding a foot out when Egg or Amber got too close. It didn't take too long before the mass of smaller Pokémon began to visibly irritate Rhydon. He began to swing his arms down to try and bat away the determined creatures. Amber deflected the first with a well-placed Force Palm before kicking at his leg and dancing out of reach.

It had taken the team of Pokémon all of five minutes to completely deplete Rhydon's patience and taunt him into roaring at them and stomping all around the ground. Wyvern, Coatl, and Flygon quickly darted over, picked up the humans they were carrying earlier, and took off again.

There was something distinctly different in the effects of Rhydon's movements this time, the shockwaves from his gestures more erratic and rumbling through the earth in a sharper thunder. Amber picked Fossil up as she and Egg leapt back and forth in between Rhydon's movements. One time they were ever slightly too hasty and ended up being thrown into the air from the power of Rhydon's stomping. Flygon had to quickly dart out so that Ash could catch the screaming Pokémon.

It took Brock a short while to convince Coatl to swoop into Rhydon's hearing range. "Rhydon! Calm down!" Brock shouted at his Pokémon. The authority in his voice cut through Rhydon's rage and the Pokémon relaxed immediately. Amber and Egg whined piteously, still panting slightly from exertion, though Ash looked victorious.

Lance stared in honest curiosity; he had never heard of a move that became more powerful as an opponent grew tired, as was implied by the strength behind Rhydon's final stomp. Even the Pokémon himself looked surprised at how worn out Amber and Egg appeared, though their respective levels explained that more clearly to Lance.

"What move was that?" Lance asked Brock.

"I'm not sure, honestly. I haven't heard of a move that had that sort of effect," Brock mumbled in response, brow furrowed in concentration. "I'll check later. It'll definitely be helpful once I work out how to incorporate it into some technique of ours." He gave Ash a grin. "Thanks for that, though I'm not sure what it is exactly that you did. Rhydon's never been the quickest learner."

Rhydon grumbled at his Trainer's statement.

Brock's expression gained a craftiness that Lance had rarely seen in the boy. "Do you have any ideas for Pupitar, Ash?" he asked.

Ash's enthusiastic response meant that they would be in the arena for a while longer. Lance left them to it, returning to his office to tend to his own team.

* * *

The banquet-style dinner planned for the Masters to gather was beautiful in its opulence. Royal blue carpets with golden silk trim and exquisite cream embroidery of the League's logo were laid out carefully, and atop them, intricately carved red-wood tables boasted mountains of decadent dishes that ranged from a carefully prepared cut fruit centerpiece to a tower of sandwiches filled with rich, creamy cheeses and thinly cut vegetables. An arrangement of rare meat-substitute products was available at one end of the table, complete with little bits of toasted bread to enjoy them on. It was a setting that inspired high-class dressing and manners and encouraged the haughtiness that both required.

Needless to say, this was perhaps the Masters' least favorite part of the meeting.

Sure, the food was good. They enjoyed the freedom to mingle with the others and nibble on appetizers and banter. Contrary to popular belief, the Masters were at the very least friendly colleagues, some of them very good friends. Their lifestyles typically meant that they couldn't see each other too often so getting a chance to relax and converse was always welcome.

What the League didn't account for was their preferred method of conversation.

Battle spoke louder than words to the Masters, and many an unspoken word had been exchanged via spars that could destroy the surrounding battlefields and rain destruction. The ground was torn up, the air thick with dust and debris—usually Sabrina spent as much of her energy in battle as she did in setting up psychic barriers to make sure that others' skirmishes didn't get too out of control. Very few Masters left the arena only bruised. Most of the time, it took the League the upcoming year to repair what damage had been done.

That being said, there were usually a few days of peace wherein the Masters limited themselves to discussion, the first battle of the week sparking a cascade of challenges and posturing whenever possible. Since the meetings had just begun, no one had challenged another quite yet.

At least, that's what Lance was counting on when he was nearly thrown to the floor by an enthusiastic pat to the back that was immediately followed by a fierce static shock. He choked slightly on the wine in his hand before looking to see who it was that hit him. He wasn't surprised to see the broad build of Lieutenant Matis Surge behind him, grinning openly.

"Lance, my man!" he said, his voice a thunderous boom. Lance returned his smile with a pointed smirk, the pride that sang in his blood snarling at the near-affront that Surge had cast on him by almost throwing him to the ground.

"Evening, Lieutenant," Lance said mildly.

Surge snorted. "It's just barely thirteen-thirty," he said. "Not anywhere close to evening."

Lance briefly looked at the clock on the wall, which dutifully read 1:24 pm. "If you're relying on that," he nodded at the clock, "it stopped a while ago. We have to put new batteries in."

Surge hesitated and looked back at the clock, uncertain now. "Feels like a mighty oversight," he grunted.

"It's not too high on our to-do list," Lance said.

"Don't tease the man, Lance, he can't tell when you're fooling him." A lilting yet monotone voice sounded behind him, an impression of faint amusement and mild exasperation brushing his consciousness (Lance realized that he had never noticed her do this before). Sabrina floated over to them, her feet barely skimming the ground in an illusion of walking, her long hair skimming her arms in a facsimile of a slight breeze. Her sharp magenta eyes were slightly obscured behind a light cyan glow.

Lance sighed. "You always ruin my fun," he complained.

Surge gave a bark of a laugh. "Always got my back, Sabrina—I appreciate it." He raised a hand as if to slap her on the back as well but a pointed look from the Psychic Master stopped him.

"I'm sure you do, you muscle-headed Unovan," she said with a disdainful expression. "Perhaps you should learn to be more observant, or at least wear a watch."

Surge scowled at her. "I shouldn't have to think of wearing a watch to not be tricked to doubting my sense of time," he said.

"Wouldn't it make more sense to be certain of your sense of time?"

Surge paused, trying to wrap his head around Sabrina's words before giving up a few seconds later. "Whatever," he said, "I'm gonna go mess with that Brock kid before Daisy and Duplica get to him. I'll see you sticks-in-the-mud later." The giant of a man was already moving away before either Lance or Sabrina could think of giving him a farewell.

The glow in Sabrina's eyes faded and she very gently set herself back on her feet on the ground. "I feel you have something to ask of me, Lance. My dear friends wish to know what sort of request would come from someone as auspicious as you."

"You flatter me," he said dryly. "This isn't the place to talk about such things—could you find me once this entire charade falls apart and we can go to my office? Less chance of being overheard."

Sabrina deliberated for a few seconds; Lance had the feeling that she wasn't really pondering and just choosing to make him wait for a little bit longer than he necessarily had to. "That seems satisfactory. I believe that time may be sooner than you may think." She gave him one last nod before glowing and slowly lifting herself back into the air.

Lance sighed before turning back to the room. He wondered if he should go and search out Brock before Surge embarrassed the boy. He might have been an adult under the law for going on his third year, but he had only just wandered into puberty and he didn't deserve more than a bit of light needling. He soon found Brock standing with another man that towered over him, though this man was just taller than average and not the monster of a human that Surge was. The man ran his hand over a slick head of cropped hair as he seemed to think through a question that Brock asked him.

"The Rhyhorn line's armor is thick enough to handle that sort of training," the man was saying. "You shouldn't worry too much about any damage, and besides, if you're close enough to your Pokémon to convince it to undergo that sort of thing, it should be more than willing to communicate back to you when it's not doing well."

"I guess," Brock responded haltingly. "It just seems cruel to have him ramming into a mountain over and over again, not to mention a bit boring for everyone."

"Then make it more interesting for it, boy," the man said with a snort. "Have it dodge attacks from the rest of your team and use the mountain as a target. Better than testing its abilities out on a sandbag that it'll be afraid to hit too hard lest it destroys everything." The man glanced up as Lance approached and nodded to him brusquely. "I see you're doing well, Master Lance."

"Well enough, Giovanni," Lance said, returning the nod. "What have you got our newest Master doing now?"

Giovanni's eyes slid to Brock again. "The boy asked me for advice on advancing the potency of his Rhydon's power, specifically that of its Drill Run. I told him when last I saw him that if I felt as though the Pokémon had reached its potential in its form, I would gift him with a Protector with which he could help the creature attain its next stage. It seems as though this is the final hurdle to that lofty goal."

Brock's chest puffed up slightly before he physically held himself in a humbler position. "Well, Rhydon's been doing really well in training ever since hearing about Master Giovanni's offer," he said. "I have an idea for a combination attack that needs the furrows that Drill Run naturally forms, but Rhydon's not able to make them quite deep enough. I'm sure this is all that he needs to be able to challenge Rhyperior for his honor and earn his name."

Giovanni scoffed almost silently. "Why you insist on such asinine traditions, I don't understand," he muttered. "I thought you'd have some sense in that head of yours."

"It's not a sign of senselessness to want to reward your Pokémon with a standalone name. Some of them wear nicknames as a badge of honor, as I'm sure Aida does," Lance said.

"You've memorized the unnecessary," Giovanni said. "Language is meant to communicate. Referring to Golem as if it were a separate entity hides your meaning."

"Aida isn't all other Golem, and other Golem cannot pretend to be Aida. Why not celebrate that difference?" Lance shot back before Brock could stammer a response out.

Giovanni studied Lance briefly before shaking his head. "Once again, we will agree to disagree, Dragon Master. One would think that if you didn't insist on commanding multiples of the same species that you might find my position more palatable. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'd like to see how Master Koga is doing. Perhaps he would amuse me a match." The brusque man walked off before Lance or Brock could entice him to stay.

Lance noticed Brock's slightly downcast expression. "Don't mind him," he said. "Giovanni is prickly at the best of times."

"I guess," Brock said. "I just don't think the method he gave me would work for Rhydon, and I have no idea what else to try."

"There's nothing wrong with adapting a training technique to suit you better," Lance said. "Perhaps you can take out some of the brutality in Giovanni's method and apply something else. I'm not sure if I know your team anywhere near well enough to give you that basic idea; have you considered asking Cobalt for help?"

Brock wrinkled his nose at the thought of asking the Steel Master for help. "I could," he said reluctantly. "Cobalt's annoying to be around, though."

"That's an understatement," a girl slightly taller than Brock with purple hair said, not even bothering to hide her eavesdropping. She polished the goggles that sat on her aviator helmet with the cuff of her glove, barely acknowledging Lance with but a nod. He snorted in amusement; Lola had never been one for subtleties. A glance at Brock revealed an awestruck preteen with thankfully better control over himself around another child. He seemed more interested in the trickster charisma that the Bug Master exuded.

Lance left Lola to draw Brock into her mischief, continuing to uphold the charade of mingling as other Masters began to very obviously get bored. Tensions weren't running high quite yet, though the amount and size of egos would definitely encourage it more than anything. Lance decided that now was as good a time as any to duck into his office and give Sabrina a chance to have their conversation.

Also, he had left Deino by herself in his office. She was most likely bored by now.

When Lance entered, Deino clicked at him from where she had curled into a small ball by his desk. She crawled over and headbutted his leg gently before sitting down at his side. Lance gave her a brief smile and reached down to pat her head. She squeaked in response.

He had barely sat down when the door swung open again and Sabrina floated in. She gently set herself down after closing the door behind her and trod forward uncertainly.

It was a well-kept secret that Sabrina de Nostredame wasn't invincible. Once mentioned it was almost obvious (she was so slight, so delicate, as though a sideways glance could knock her over) but she had carefully constructed a myth around herself of a demigod, a person who had passed the limits of humanity, someone who could not be matched by a mortal, just below a legend. Her innate Psychic energy had developed too quickly when she was younger, redirecting her growth away from developing the robustness that most humans had to finessing her mental capacities. For most of her still-short life, Sabrina had hidden behind thick, somewhat baggy clothes that concealed her dangerously slim figure from anyone who might think her more vulnerable than she actually was, and truly the visual of a young girl, glowing green and effortlessly floating across the ground, was more than enough to silence any disbelievers.

Lance saw a girl who was barely able to hold herself together with a diet meticulously put together to keep her health perfectly balanced and her body functional. When she fully relinquished herself to her physicality, Sabrina was a waif of a person, easily tired by a walk up a staircase or a somewhat lengthy conversation. She was one of the very few human psychics who was so ruled by their talent that they could barely function without it. Her affinity for the Abra line was no wonder; the closest parallel for her was a Pokémon that required its abilities to keep its head up.

When Sabrina had folded herself into a chair and taken a couple of deep breaths, she turned to Lance. The sharp intelligence in her eyes hadn't faded at all; if anything, she scrutinized him more firmly now than she had previously.

She had more than proven herself an adept Master of her Type; nothing she did now could truly disrupt her perch on her throne.

"What is it that you needed to pull me away from the others?" she asked.

Lance sat back in his own chair, meeting her gaze with little worry. "I'm in a little bit of a predicament, shall we say," he started.

Sabrina raised a single eyebrow, silently gesturing for him to go on.

"To get to the point, I've got custody over a young boy and his companions, and I'd like for you to give him a general intake and possibly train one of his partners in particular. They would both have to meet you before deciding on this, but I'd prefer to get your affirmation before introducing the idea to them."

Sabrina coughed out a not-quite suppressed laugh of surprise. "Well, Lance, that wasn't quite what I expected this conversation to be about." She tapped her chin with a finger as she thought. "I would have to close Saffron Gym for longer than I anticipated. Granted, it is early enough in the Championship Season that no one of true merit would be coming through, and I could perhaps ask one of my better trainees to judge, and you do intrigue me with this." Lance had the feeling that Sabrina was thinking out loud more for his benefit than her own. "There's merit in my staying here to work with whatever child you found somewhere, and there's merit in my saying no and returning to my life. You clearly want the former, and many would expect me to choose the latter. What's your argument against those?"

Lance held his hands up in a mockery of a shrug. "You could very well tell me to stuff it and go back to your life, Sabrina, or you could choose to acknowledge your curiosity and stay to work with the kid. Either works for me; I'd have to track down another specialist to work with him if you say no or I'd have to jump into preparing him to meet a new person. All you're deciding for me is how long I have to wait to make those kinds of entreaties to him."

Sabrina gave Lance a rare smile. "You truly do know how to be persuasive when you want to be," she commented. Lance decided not to respond. After pausing to see if he would, Sabrina began to glow again and slowly unfolded herself from the chair, holding herself up with her telekinesis.

"Well, Lance, I would love to accept right now, but I'm afraid that isn't quite how we work, is it?" she said, a wicked smirk beginning to curve on her face. "It would be simultaneously rather wonderful and rather boring if that's how things were done, but you know the formalities."

"But of course. One-on-one, plain arena two if it isn't already in use, perhaps? I don't want to make the reason known to every Master present, but we should be able to mask it in such a way that they can still decide our representatives for us."

Sabrina nodded to him. "Indeed. I will set aside ten of my brightest and expect the same from you. Whatever the outcome, all I need to feel is how steadfast you will be in this pursuit."

"Your prowess is already unparalleled, so I won't offend you by saying that's my main focus," Lance responded. "All I need from you is a good show. I trust in your ability to choose the outcome of this battle."

Her smirk softened back into the smile from before. "That's what makes you different from the previous Champions, doesn't it?" she said softly. "They did not trust. You do, for reasons unknown to me."

Lance actually shrugged this time. "I have to. You're my Kanto Masters for a reason; I trust each and every one of you implicitly because you've proven yourself to me."

Sabrina's eyes misted over slightly. "Perhaps to your downfall." Before he could ask her to elaborate, she turned and floated to the door, opening it silently without lifting a finger. "In two hours, we reconvene in plain arena two. We fight on the honor of your request to me. We settle separately from the outcome. May our words ring true today." She gave him a slight bow before leaving the office, closing the door with a quiet click. Lance watched the green glow fade through the crack under his door.

Deino gave a confused squeak. Lance looked to her, patting her on the head. "You're about to see how we truly decide the answers to our problems," he told her. "It's harder to hide behind commands and Pokémon. We speak our truth then. You must understand." Deino chirped an affirmative.

Lance sighed before looking to the team on his hip. He would have to decide who would be put into the possible pot soon. Trying to convince a dragon that just because it got taken off of one roster didn't mean that another was being chosen over it was probably going to be a two-hour job. Lance wondered if that was why Sabrina had dictated those specific terms. He wouldn't quite put it past her.

"I didn't think that you'd be the first to crack, Lance." The mirth in her voice has grown at this third repetition. Tired of the charade, he decided to finally respond.

"I didn't crack," Lance said. His slowly growing impatience with his companion was audible.

The woman smirked at his irritation, readjusting the brim of her hat. "I'm sure, I'm sure," she said with an almost lofty tone. She examined her nails with an air of faux nonchalance. "It's not like it isn't so important that literally no other Masters know what's going on—oh wait!" She looked to him with mock surprise. "That's exactly what's happening! How strange!"

"I know you're peeved, Green, but that's no reason to get this ruffled about it," Lance growled back.

She raised her hands in surrender, taking a step back, her smirk still dancing on her face. Green had always loved getting under his skin. "No, no, I get it! You and Sabrina are just filled with secrets that we wouldn't be able to keep. It's not fair for us to have to know something so great—you two are truly looking out for our best interests in not telling a single soul what's going on."

"You're only here to get on my nerves because you think my team can't do anything against yours," Lance said bluntly, pushing past her and towards the arena.

Green continued to dance along behind him, completely nonplussed. "I'm not that dumb. You could probably wreck my team just as easily as I could wreck yours," she said. "I do, however, believe that I'm allowed to be smug since half of your techniques rely on dragon-type moves that you can't use against us. That's a win if you ask me."

"Is that a challenge?"

Green snorted. "Focus on the one you've got right now, flame-head. Check back in once Sabrina's done flinging your ruffians across the room."

"Ruffians?" Lance asked, raising an eyebrow at her.

"So eager for battle," she said with a sniff. "I'm sure none of your Pokémon have experienced the true loveliness of a tea party in the summer."

"Neither have yours."

"Details." They arrived at the arena. "Well, this is where we part ways. I'd say good luck, but then you'd say that you don't need it, and you don't deserve a cool one-liner like that." Green flounced off before he could respond.

He scoffed quietly. Fairies.

There was more of an audience forming than Lance expected: Giovanni and Koga were lingering in the back and quietly conversing to each other (the former making eye contact with Lance and giving him a brusque nod), Brock nervously bobbing his leg in his seat next to a bored-looking Lola, the three other League-bound members unafraid to be caught staring directly at him. Green had skipped off to stand with Duplica, Erika, and Daisy, joining in their conversation without missing a single beat.

Sabrina was serenely floating, already in position in the trainer's box on the other side of the arena. She didn't acknowledge Lance until he took his own spot across from her, instead concentrating on the circle of Pokéballs that orbited her. Lance didn't have anything quite so fancy at his disposal; he just put his possible representatives in the tray carved into the protective barrier that surrounded his box.

The other Masters present must have already discussed the proceedings of the match because Duplica and Daisy broke away from their conversation with Green and Erika to approach Lance and Sabrina respectively.

Duplica was a somewhat recent addition to the Masters, having easily wrested the title from her predecessor by showing an ingenuity that most didn't attribute to the Normal-type, despite its known reputation for adaptability. She had perhaps the expected powerhouses on her team, Pokémon that took advantage of the relatively robust nature that their typing gave them naturally, but her true trump cards were her two Ditto, synthetically created pink blobs that were known for their ability to Transform into any Pokémon species whose genetic material they acquired. Most Ditto were reserved for medical use or scientific research, and many regarded them as useful for only that. Duplica had found a seed of a potential and pursued it relentlessly. After many months of work, she finally reaped what she sowed in Ditto and Mini-Dit. They didn't even need a visual stimulus to Transform anymore, nor were they held back by the move set that their opponents boasted. Perhaps their only laughable trait was the idiosyncratic errors in their Transformation; all of Ditto's attempts sported its typical beady-eyed blank face while Mini-Dit's forms never grew past two feet tall. Neither of these handicaps affected their fighting ability. It didn't matter what face your attacker wore when it demolished you, and Mini-Dit's size was in many ways an advantage rather than an issue.

Duplica had turned a pile of sentient pink goo into a veritable army.

A blank-faced Pidgey sat perched on her shoulder today. It sat just slightly too still to be a nervous bird in a room filled with badly hidden powerful auras, and it gave him a calculating look that Lance didn't quite trust. Duplica absentmindedly reached a hand up to scratch under its beak as she addressed him.

"How're you doing, Lance? Having a good time? A good day?" she asked.

"Good enough," he responded before taking her entire outfit in. "What are you wearing?"

She smiled at him and twirled around. "It's a new imitation! Don't I look just _dashing_ in it?" She flicked a wrist, allowing a stream of shimmering red-gold fabric to catch the light more successfully. Besides the strange wrist and ankle decorations, she was wearing a long headscarf of the same material and a cone on her forehead, as well as a cream-colored dress that hovered over her knees.

"Indeed."

Duplica chuckled at his short response. "I appreciate it. Let's see if Ditto has any thoughts on who you should use, then?" She put her fist to the Pidgey at her shoulder, coaxing it to hop onto her knuckle, before extending her arm and encouraging it to peck at Lance's Pokéballs. The bird cooed before fluttering over and giving the prepared spheres a critical eye. It decidedly marched over to one and nudged it with its beak.

"Good pick, Ditto! I'm sure your champion will be as fierce as you could be," Duplica cooed, holding her hand back to her shoulder for the false Pidgey to perch on again. "Don't let me down, Lance! And stop keeping secrets from us; you know how nosy we all are."

Lance heard the echoes of warning in her lighthearted banter and simply nodded in response. Daisy must have given Sabrina a pep talk as well, as the two Masters rejoined their Fairy and Grass counterparts at around the same time.

Most of Sabrina's team were tucked away into her belt, a single Pokéball hovering in the air. She seemed victorious already, though the expression probably meant nothing as none of the Masters could be considered immune from arrogance. Bruno had taken it upon himself to referee and was joined by both the Pancham he had tailing him everywhere as well as his signature fighter, Machamp.

"On my count, release in unison," Bruno called out. Lance picked up the ball that the false Pidgey had chosen and prepared it, waiting for the signal.

"Three!"

Lance briefly wondered if this was the best way to go about this. There must have been more quiet ways of solving this.

"Two!"

He also had the feeling that Ash would be particularly disappointed to miss this event.

"One! Release!"

Two flashes of red light.

Lance realized why Sabrina had been smirking now. He could hear Green cackling maniacally from the sides above everyone's sudden murmurs as they analyzed the Pokémon that had been released, filing away every detail spotted or pointed out to each other.

Altaria was hovering in the air, choosing to remain airborne as he made almost lazy circles around Lance's side of the field. Lance wasn't fooled by this nonchalant behavior—he could see Altaria's wary gaze as he took in the curve to his enemy's head, the strange hair-like helmet that framed her face like a bob-cut, her wide red eyes fixed on his, the almost fragile nature of her thin limbs and the illusion of flowing fabric that her white body gave off.

Gardevoir regarded Altaria with a sense of academic interest before her eyes started glowing. The glow spread to the rest of her body, twisting white as it did, before settling onto her like a faint armor that then completely faded from view. Lance's eyes narrowed. If that was how Gardevoir's Synchronize manifested, then he would have to be careful with the strategies he used. It would be his luck for his Pokémon to apply the status condition that was his own downfall.

Random chance would have chosen the exact member of Sabrina's team to perfectly counter the partner that had been chosen for him.

"Prepare for combat. Dazing Dance to start, then Divine Light until my next command." Altaria crooned his understanding, making tighter circles in the air in preparation.

Sabrina remained silent, but Gardevoir's eyes began to pulsate with the same eerie light that shone from her Trainer's. Mental link established, the lithe Psychic- and Fairy-type bowed to Altaria's flying form before crouching in anticipation.

Bruno didn't have to announce the battle starting. He simply clapped once, a strident sound that echoed through the arena.

Immediately following the signal, Altaria gave a proud cry before flicking his wings, sending a Mist of dust falling from between the fluffy down. He began to make tighter circles, singing further cries that began to resonate with a given power that radiated from him, making his wingbeats stronger until he was practically diving into the Mist he had formed and sent sprawling throughout the battlefield. Altaria then soared, turning on a hairpin to fly directly up as he glowed with a shining light, one that pulsated with pink and lavender light.

Gardevoir for her part refused to stay motionless for this. She held her arms out to her side, summoning a pink smoke that rolled onto the ground as the Mist from the Dazing Dance touched down. The two fogs didn't compete for presence, instead beginning to mix together into an ethereal haze that shimmered in the white light of the arena and the strange light Altaria was beginning to emit. Gardevoir then closed her eyes and seemed to visibly relax, the tension in her body fading ever so slightly. When her eyes opened again, she looked almost insurmountable, a staunch figure that was adamant about not letting Lance cross her.

Altaria gave a mellifluous screech as he reached the zenith of his flight, his body shining as though he were about to evolve yet again. He flashed red for a split second. The Humming Pokémon sang a single clear note before diving towards Gardevoir at a speed she could not react to, expertly turning to run into her side with the full force of the Sky Attack fueling the move. The harsh light burst from his body as it hit her, almost latching onto Gardevoir in its haste to explode out of Altaria's body. She flinched from the hit but managed to regain her footing, once again closing her eyes and centering herself. A tangible power began to form around her.

"Give us another Dance, Altaria," Lance called out. Altaria didn't verbally respond to that command, merely diving straight into another complex swirling choreography, his body surrounded by the combined fogs, the deep magenta light from his movements refracted in those barely visible particles.

Gardevoir finally moved at that very second, moving her foot back and crouching slightly. Her eyes flickered, glowing an ice blue for a split second before fading into a light fuchsia and then into a shade that matched Sabrina's green glow once more. Mists of power in those ephemeral colors flashed in her hands for a split second before she flung them both into the air, the ice blue light carving a path through the air effortlessly while the light pink light immediately burst into a cloud of rapidly dissipating sparkles. Something hung in the air as the mist around the two Pokémon faded back into an innocuously normal state. Lance didn't trust how normal it all felt.

"Wing Blades. Get in close," he said tersely. He didn't have to call it out too loudly for Altaria to hear; a barely-there shimmer of silver on the typically delicately soft feathers of Altaria's wings was the only indication that the bird in fact had. Altaria whipped himself into a spiral, wings flickering into and out of a blur that gained a sheen unnatural to his feathery down. In a single movement, he cracked out of the spiral and into a dive straight towards Gardevoir, the wind singing as he zoomed through the air towards her. A strident note warned of the unavoidable attack, and Gardevoir's answering cry was drowned out by the whistling wind that followed him. As Altaria began to regain altitude while nimbly shedding the final remnants of the Wing Blades, Gardevoir closed her eyes and took a deep breath, closing her eyes yet again and gaining a now very visible glow to her.

Lance narrowed his eyes as he tried to analyze Gardevoir's specific strategy. She had already mostly abandoned the typical technique that Sabrina's team adopted, having stood her ground and chosen to power herself up somehow (Lance suspected Calm Mind). He didn't have an encyclopedic knowledge of Gardevoir's move set, as the species was neither a dragon nor originally discovered in Kanto, and the focus on powering herself was beginning to make him nervous. Whenever Gardevoir landed a hit on Altaria now, it was guaranteed to be extremely painful, and it would be harder to use any of the techniques that Lance was already limited in by Pokémon-type alone.

It was time to start playing a little bit risky.

"Altaria! Toxic!" He called out. Lance saw Sabrina's eyes widen, startled for a second. He himself had observed Gardevoir's Synchronize taking effect. There was every reason to believe that by choosing a crippling toxin, one that he had worked with Altaria to develop and begin to incorporate his type Aura into. There was no reason for either of Altaria's types to be useful in this situation, but if Gardevoir were to be hit by a potent poison, she would be incapacitated for the rest of the battle. Gardevoir's rather flimsy but effective shield against that was the notion that to debilitate you would debilitate yourself. Only a fool would knowingly inflict damage of that caliber to his own Pokémon just to win.

Of course, Lance was no fool. A fool would not be a Type Master, let alone Tohjo Champion.

Altaria's wings began to glow a violent violet as a caustic sweat began to bead up between his feathers. He sharply turned and flew directly at Gardevoir, wings spread open. Gardevoir suddenly vanished from where she stood as Altaria was about to hit her, but almost as if predicting her next location, Altaria turned on a dime and slammed right into her. The purple glow immediately enveloped both Pokémon before Altaria visibly shook it off, forcefully flapping his wings so that he could fly back into the safety of the air, completely unaffected.

Lance allowed himself a small smile at Sabrina's sudden clarity and narrowed eyes. Altaria had long since learned to incorporate the accuracy of Aerial Ace into any of his maneuvers in battle, and a Safeguard quietly hidden within Divine Light had been all that was needed to ensure that Sabrina entered the battle slightly too cocky.

Gardevoir let out a choking sound, suddenly losing her grace in a single moment. She buckled over, the purple oil that Altaria had thrown onto her absorbing into her body and racking her body. The light that Gardevoir had released earlier suddenly manifested again, one spiraling to crash into her while the other fashioned itself into a projectile that hurtled towards Altaria. In the brief moment that Altaria was hit and stumbled through the air, Gardevoir seemed to stand slightly more steadily, cuts from the earlier Wing Blades healing rapidly. When the Emotion Pokémon looked back up, she looked almost murderous. It was an expression that Lance didn't think he'd ever seen on a Pokémon of her species before.

A furious fuchsia blaze lit in her eyes and she let out a cry. A faint image of a full moon fluttered around her before Gardevoir pulled in the power that manifested it into a tight ball of energy. With the flick of a wrist, she threw it towards Altaria. The orb exploded into a ray of concentrated power halfway to him; Gardevoir's eyes flashed a stark red and the power was suddenly enveloped by a light blue glow that neatly split it into a countless number of smaller rays that twisted through the air to form a cage around Altaria.

"Dragon Beam! Get out of there, now!" Lance barked. Altaria screeched as he was embraced by the countless lines rushing towards him, wincing as some began wrapping around him to bring him deeper into the lines. The Humming Pokémon paused for a second before letting out a far more piercing cry and directing a startling neon green beam of energy towards the origin of the trap. Gardevoir quickly cut off the move to Teleport a yard away, neatly avoiding the Beam, and Altaria managed to shake off the last few dregs that trailed on him. The two Pokémon looked to each other, both images of elegance shattered by the sneers that they wore. Gardevoir's body pulsed from the Toxic once more; she let out a painful croon in the back of her throat but shook it off otherwise.

Gardevoir did not seem happy by the turn of events. She had long since abandoned her previous nobility and now favored a rigid posture, crouched over herself, ripping away the impression of effortlessness in favor of looking every inch the calculating adversary that she was. She straightened and held her arms out in the posture of a martyr, her eyes drifting half-closed.

She began to sing.

Altaria began to drift towards the ground, one cautious eye on Gardevoir as he attempted to slowly approach his Trainer.

He immediately shot back into the air when Gardevoir's gaze snapped open and her entire body glowed a violent magenta light that carved vertically into the air. The Emotion Pokémon's eyes never wavered from Altaria's downy form and she slowly moved an arm in front of her, ensuring that the bird was in her sights.

"Altaria, be ready!" Lance barked out, wishing that he could give a longer command but knowing that Altaria needed every millisecond to avoid the incoming blow. He cursed to himself—Sabrina's underground plot had finally revealed itself.

Stored Power. A strange move that benefited more strongly from a Pokémon bolstering itself. A move that many Psychic-types soon learned to bend to their whim, as Gardevoir had through her multiple Calm Minds earlier in the battle.

A move that was directed straight towards Altaria.

Gardevoir gestured downwards. The ground immediately below Altaria burst into a column of magenta light that seared the eyes, shooting upwards towards him. Altaria gave off a piercing cry, his pain magnified as he struggled to stay aloft during the duration of the move.

"Break out! Final hit!" Lance roared. Altaria gave an answering screech before forcing himself to twist into one last Dragon Dance while still encompassed by Gardevoir's Stored Power. The last spiral transitioned into Altaria lazily floating into the sky. At his zenith, Altaria adopted a fiery red glow that he quickly forced into a comet-like shell as he dove towards Gardevoir at breakneck speeds, a sonic boom accompanying his sudden descent. Gardevoir quickly moved her arms towards her torso just as Altaria seemed to hit the ground with a loud BOOM! and a cloud of dust.

When the dust cleared, Lance and Sabrina could see that Altaria had just barely managed to hit Gardevoir, who was visibly struggling to maintain the thin blue border that held Altaria in place one foot away from her. The Humming Pokémon was making incremental progress towards his opponent and was refusing to drop his attack. Gardevoir seemed exhausted but determined to hold him off. Her body rippled with the earlier Toxic attack; she stumbled and for a second Psychic seemed to fail but she managed to hold onto it long enough to prevent the full weight of Altaria's Sky Attack from hitting her.

"Draw," Sabrina called out verbally, her worried gaze never leaving her trembling Pokémon.

"Accepted," Lance responded immediately. "Altaria, ceasefire. Stand down."

Altaria immediately dropped Sky Attack and drooped slightly, wearily looking to Lance as he sat down on the floor and puffed his feathers up. Gardevoir let her arms fall down gracelessly, shivering still from the Toxic within her. She soon vanished into a burst of red light. Sabrina set Gardevoir's Pokéball onto a small divot at the back of her Trainer's box that quickly transported it into the healing bay before turning back to Lance.

"You've made your point, Dragon Master Lance," Sabrina called out. "I will meet with you tomorrow morn. Please be prepared." With that, she left.

Lance quietly cursed her dramatic nature and returned Altaria. He immediately left the room, ignoring the other Masters staring at him as he went to get his partner healed and then immediately to Ash's room to explain what would happen.

* * *

 **Much apologies for the long delay and for lack of responses to the last chapter's reviews; a few more plot ideas (none Pokémon, unfortunately for anyone here who is only interested in that subsection of this website) surfaced and I pursued a few of those to take a quick break from this chapter. I could easily have written 10,000 more words for it, but I thought that you might want to read this before 2020. I have a small request for you lovelies: please let me know which Masters you'd like to see dueling in the upcoming chapter(s?) in a review! Just state which Type you'd like to see battle and I'll see if I can make it happen. Finally, I know that I changed my capitalization rules this chapter. I'll be editing the other chapters to mirror this one, as I've decided that I like it. A lot changes in a few months.**


	5. Honed

Lance could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times he had seen Sabrina speechless. The first time had been when she was given her first Pokémon, an undersized Abra that soon grew to become the cornerstone of her team. The second had been when she achieved Mastery at an age at which most of her peers were still considered children.

Her control was flawless usually; it was surprisingly fun to watch her struck dumb.

Ash cocked his head sideways. "Is she okay?" he asked, concerned at her stillness.

"I'm sure she's fine, Ash," Lance said, leaning back in his chair. Ash took in his relaxed and amused posture and took it as a sign that this was something to enjoy. The little boy turned back around to the teenage psychic and gave her a friendly smile, waving brightly. Sabrina blinked, her hair slowly flowing in a breeze that didn't exist.

"I know that I was told about you, but nothing could have been enough warning for this," she murmured quietly.

"Did Lance tell you about all of the moves that I've learned?" he chirped at her.

Sabrina tilted her head to a side, scrutinizing Ash further. "Define that for me."

"Like this!" Ash immediately ran backwards a few steps, stumbling slightly in that short distance, and bounced on the balls of his feet a couple of times before taking two steps forward, launching himself into the air, and somersaulting. Or, at the very least, attempting to. He ended up landing squarely on his bottom with a loud enough smack that even Sabrina winced sympathetically.

"Mewtwo!" he called out in half of a whine, flopping over on the floor. "You were supposed'a catch me if that happened!"

The purple Pokémon wore an expression of innocence. _'When-where-why-hmm confusion-uncertain-when never-never-knew told-not-not can't-blame-no nothing-did-didn't'_ ran through the air. Lance managed to hold his neutral expression at the woven story. Sabrina looked at Mewtwo with a wide and appraising look; Lance wondered if she was able to sense the underlying impressions due to her affinity to the mind arts or if Mewtwo had willingly projected them onto her.

"Interesting," she murmured, not sparing a look to Lance. "I'm seeing why you're ill-prepared for this."

Before Lance could get offended by her comment, Ash turned to her and frowned slightly, nose scrunching. "That's kinda mean of you to say," he said.

Sabrina cocked an eyebrow at that. She floated over slightly to loom over Ash, who was still sat on the floor. "I assure you that I may seem 'mean' but I don't intend it. Sometimes, simply stating what you are thinking is the wisest course."

Ash blinked at her. "You're a kid too. Why are you telling me how to think?"

Sabrina started. "I am _not_ a child," she said stiffly. "I am Kanto's Psychic Master and worked hard to get to the level that I'm at. I will not be disrespected in this way."

"Oh, I didn't mean to disres-ect you," Ash said. "But I don't get why you sound so grown-up when you're not grown-up yet."

"I need to speak in this manner in order to _get_ the respect in the first place," Sabrina said, though her hackles were slowly starting to lower. She regarded the young boy with an air of some discontent. "Eloquence will be our first lesson, it seems."

Mewtwo glanced over to Sabrina and then glanced back towards Ash and Lance. _'Approval-yes-yes good-yes-fine yes-her-her enjoyment-amusement-approval'_ ran through Lance's mind. Lance relaxed at the undercurrent of satisfaction that sang in the back of his head. He hadn't realized just how reliant he was on Mewtwo's reactions to assure him of how Ash might react.

Sabrina gave the two a once-over before locking her eyes on Mewtwo's. They glowed a faint cyan for a split second, fading out just as Mewtwo's eyes grew much wider in shock. His eyes didn't glow in return, but a much swifter undercurrent began to mutter through Lance's head, too fast to even be able to word the sensations that flashed through. The flickering of the emotions and detached words that echoed in the back of his mind was more annoying than painful, though it was starting to slowly kickstart a dull ringing. It was abruptly cut off when Sabrina's eyes glowed yet again.

The Psychic Master turned to Lance. "Leave us," she commanded. "They will be distracted by your presence, Dragon Master."

Lance briefly considered protesting before acquiescing, knowing full well that she could easily have thrown him out, no help needed, if he decided to antagonize her. He bowed to Sabrina before whisking himself from the room. The door was gently closed behind him.

* * *

Lance had been reading over Sabrina's notes on the intake she conducted for him on Ash (he definitely had some form of attention disorder that, paired with adrenaline, might could be the difference between life and death for him. Lance wanted to investigate that further) when he heard about the match that he was now observing. He winced as Surge's Raichu managed to twist in the air just enough to avoid the meteor that was Blaine's Charizard. The draconic Pokémon managed to quickly flick a wing out and avoid slamming into the ground at full speed, but she still skidded on the ground, having managed to flip onto her feet and catch herself. Lance took a moment to appreciate the Charizard. She had been bred and trained to be as close to a full Fire-type as possible: her very presence heated up the air around her, and her tail burned white-hot.

"C'mon Chu, roast her! Thunder Twist, version 4!"

The floating Raichu let out a screech that sounded half like his normal cry and half like a whirring motor. He whipped himself through the air, still balancing on the end of his rounded tail. A shower of sparks flooded from his cheeks and his eyes glowed a faint pink as he reached out electrified tendrils in a swirling rope towards the grounded Charizard.

"So, what sparked this, again?" Lance asked Lorelei, who stood in the back of the audience.

She lightly grimaced as Charizard quickly huffed out two sharp bursts of flame before whirling around and sending a pair of wind-based blades through the fire. The burning projectiles reflected in her glasses. Lance had the feeling that she was already preparing strategies to counteract them. "Surge made the 'mistake' of gloating about his newest trainee," she said, indicating the air quotes with her fingers. "Apparently, he's the son of some Kahuna from Alola, and he told Surge about the variants in his region. Brought him a bred Pichu and everything; now we've got a monster on our hands. Blaine made some smart comment about how it would be incinerated just as easily as Rai can be. Now we're here."

Lance squinted at the strange looking Raichu, his eyes narrowed even as he cheerfully bounced in the air. "Is it using Psychic naturally?" he asked, impressed.

Lorelei nodded. "Not something I expected, even after all of Matis's bragging. Blaine will have a counter prepared immediately after this match, but I wanted to see if his adaptability has gotten any better."

"Would you say it has?"

Lorelei glanced back at the field just as Charizard peppered the entire arena with more flaming Air Cutters. "Would you?" she asked, sarcasm dusting her words.

"Fair enough." Lance's eyes narrowed. He lowered his voice; he didn't trust Green to overhear something he didn't want her to. "Do you think Ash would be interested in talking to Surge about raising Egg?"

"I can enthusiastically verify that vice versa would be true," Lorelei said, her voice equally quiet, "but you may have to ask your ward what he thinks beforehand. I shudder to think of how the Lieutenant would choose to treat a child, no matter what the age."

Lance shrugged. "The relevant Masters will most likely know about Ash by the end of this meeting, if only to poll who would be interested in working with him. Surge knowing slightly earlier out of necessity is no huge issue, in my opinion."

"Your opinion isn't the one that matters here," Lorelei said. She abruptly turned and made to leave the arena.

"What's your hurry?" Lance asked.

"I've seen enough of this foolery to know how to freeze both the meathead's and the riddler's schemes in their tracks," she called back over her shoulder. "I'm going to ensure their mortification, should either be so unwise as to challenge me."

Lance watched her go and turned in time to see Chu dart up through the ignited Air Cutters and explode a vastly oversized Electro Ball in Charizard's face, blasting the larger Pokémon backwards. As always, her observations seemed to be correct; the embarrassing moment for Blaine had long since stopped being educational for the other Masters. Lance left to Surge's boisterous cackling at his opponent's misfortune.

* * *

"I must admit, Lance, when you said you had a request for me, this isn't quite what I expected."

Scott, Lance, and Professor Samuel Oak sat at one end of Lance's office, observing the three children on the other end interact. Coatl had decided that he was going to watch over them from a much closer distance; the Dragonite had carefully curled up in a pseudo-sleeping position and said nothing as the children clambered over him. Well, some clambered over him. Ash had opted to sit on Coatl's head, admiring the faint layer of fuzz that coated the Dragonite's scales due to his mixed heritage. Anabel seemed content to sit by Coatl's tail, leaning against him. Eevee was curled up in her lap. Oak's grandson, a perky and rambunctious boy, had managed to climb up the dragon and was sitting between his wings.

"Lookit me, Gramps!" he crowed to the adults. "I'm king of the dragon!" Coatl opened one eye and gave the little boy a look of disgruntled, patient incredulity before closing it again and settling back down, gently relaxing his muscles so as to not jostle either of the boys that perched on top of him.

Professor Oak chuckled at Gary's enthusiasm. "Be careful, your majesty!" he called back. "I don't want to have to take you back to your parents hurt." The little boy scoffed at the concern but carefully climbed back down to rejoin his compatriots. Ash was less careful; he sprang off of Coatl's head before Lance could say anything.

"I'm guessing that Blue hasn't let up on him, then?" Lance said, deciding to let Ash's energetics go for once.

Professor Oak sighed before relaxing in his seat slightly. "No. If anything, that fool son of mine encourages the competitiveness. He told me, 'Pa, I used to be that way too, and look at me now, preparing to take Master Giovanni's title from him. If he keeps that tenacity while growing up, Gary'll more than outstrip me some day.' I sometimes wonder if all of the child psychologists are correct to be lobbying for an older training age minimum, if that's how we're going to let our children develop." He fell silent again, watching as Gary said something to Ash and Anabel, prompting them both to follow him in sitting down.

Scott chuckled. "Well, I'd say that I'm more than happy that your grandson is gregarious if it brings Anabel out of her shell more. I really should have tried to arrange some play-dates for her earlier, if she's going to be that social now."

Professor Oak gave him a curious look. "She's been sitting with her Pokémon on her lap all afternoon and hasn't said a word yet."

"She's not treating Eevee like a plush to hide behind, either," Scott retorted. "Baby steps."

Professor Oak merely raised an eyebrow at Scott's earnestness. Before any of the men could say anything else, they heard a loud grunt from the corner that the children were in. They looked over to see Ash doubled up on himself, Gary cackling quietly as Anabel merely stared with widened eyes. Eevee wasn't in Anabel's lap anymore, instead standing in front of her, head cocked to one angle in confusion.

"Is everything alright over there?" Lance called over.

Ash wasn't able to say anything in between his wheezes. Gary's laughter doubled as he fell onto his back, legs kicking in the air. Anabel was now covering the bottom half of her face with both of her hands.

"Anabel? Can you tell us what's up?" Scott asked.

The girl started trembling and crumpling herself. Lance nearly stood up and out of his seat out of worry. What happened? Why was she refusing to say anything? Only Scott's relaxed posture cued to both him and Professor Oak that everything was fine.

A couple of seconds later, Lance was just as reassured. Peals of high-pitched giggles spilled out from between her fingers and joined in with Gary's uncontrollable howls. Ash had finally regained his breath and was giving them all halfhearted glares. "Not funny," he coughed out.

"Okay then, kids, who can explain to us unobservant adults what just happened?" Professor Oak said.

"I-I-I got it, Gramps," Gary said between barks of laughter. "We were talkin' about how Pokémon and people c-can't really fight anymore"— he had calmed down a bit and wasn't laughing anymore, though he had acquired a potent hiccup— "Ashy-b-boy here said that h-he could stand up to a Pokémon if he needed to and talked about how-w you and Master Sabrina were workin' on it with him or something. And Eevee overheard and decided that he wanted to test it out a-a-a-and h-he j-j-j—" Gary lost the battle against his amusement, his cackles now punctuated by the sharp, loud hiccups that now plagued him.

The adults patiently waited for one of the kids to finish explaining. Ash seemed grumpy over the entire situation, Gary was once again paralyzed in laughter and rolling on the floor, and Anabel was still attempting to reel herself in. Finally, she was able to finish the story.

"Eevee thought it would be funny t-to test Ash's skill by Tackling him right in the belly," she said, a snort slipping out between her giggles. "And he wasn't expecting it at all, and…" She gestured helplessly at Ash where he sat on the floor, legs splayed out, arms crossed.

"I see," Scott said. "Thank you for explaining everything. Ash, are you alright?"

"Rain," the boy responded.

Professor Oak and Scott blinked.

"Right as, he means," Lance quickly translated.

"Did he pick that up from Sabrina?" Scott asked.

"He must have. Or, perhaps, from another one of his friends."

Professor Oak studied Lance's features. "Weren't you saying that Ash was sorely lacking in the friend department? That _is_ why you asked for me to bring my grandson after realizing that they were around the same age, correct?"

"Ah, he didn't have any _human_ friends. I'm sorry, I thought I made that distinction clear, but I guess not," Lance said.

"Where are his Pokémon, then?"

"His _friends_ " – Lance didn't mind having to correct the other two men; how could they have implicitly understood the strange camaraderie from that group of strangers? – "are a bit shyer. I think they rely on his opinion on other people before choosing to meet them. As Ash seems to be getting along well enough with Gary and Anabel, unfortunate happenstances aside, I can't imagine why they might want to keep hiding in the future. I'd be shocked if Ash hid them past today."

Professor Oak chuckled. "I'm sure Gary would be rather jealous if Ash indeed has as large of a collection as you are implying. The boy has been begging me for a Pokémon already; I'm tempted to give him one of my starter eggs and teaching him some responsibility while he's still young enough."

"I must have been around his age when the elders of the Blackthorn Clan decided that I was to help tend the dragons at the altar," Lance mused. "Maybe we should require that all Trainers first learn how to care for Pokémon for at least five years before they obtain their licenses for independent travel. We could discuss it while all of the Masters are still around here."

"How exciting," Scott said dryly.

"Gary, if you want, I can ask Eevee to Tackle you too to see how tough you are!" Anabel's voice chirped cheerfully. Lance looked back over; Ash had fully recovered from the unexpected hit, no worse for the wear, though he was still pouting at Gary for laughing at his misfortune. Anabel was sitting with her legs splayed outwards, leaning back on her hands. Gary was lying on the ground still.

Gary blanched slightly at Anabel's suggestion, quickly pushing himself into a sitting position. "Nah, that's alright, Anabel. I don't think I'm anywhere near as tough as Eevee is. How'd'ja get him, anywho?"

Anabel shrugged. Gary waited for a couple of seconds before he also shrugged and kicked a leg at Ash to get his attention. The two boys started somewhat cheerfully needling each other again. Anabel watched in resigned confusion.

"I do quite appreciate that Gary seems more relaxed here. Green seems intent on making sure that her relationship with Blue is mirrored in their children. While it's perhaps sweet and nostalgic in her own way, I'm not sure if it's necessarily healthy for either of the kids," Professor Oak said.

"I'll admit that I wasn't too sure about this at first," Scott said, "but I've never seen Anabel so calm and open. I would be more than happy to bring her back on a regular basis, if you two don't mind."

Whatever Lance would have said was cut off by the kids suddenly all getting up and running out of his office. Professor Oak and Scott both looked over to their stampede out in alarm before looking to Lance for answers. The Dragon Master shrugged before reaching for a Pokéball on his desk and flicking it to the ground. Deino shook her head to clear it slightly before looking up to Lance expectantly.

"Can you make sure Ash, Gary, and Anabel don't get up to anything too devious?" Lance asked.

Deino barked in response before turning and happily trotting out of the room.

Professor Oak watched her go, shaking his head. "I haven't had any time recently to even think about training a new Pokémon from the ground up. My research is taking over my life," he said.

"I could recommend you a new line to investigate, if you want," Lance said. "I'm sure you've heard all about most of them, though."

Professor Oak merely raised an eyebrow at him. "I don't know which you are currently referring to, but I'm all ears."

Lance started to wax philosophical over the pros and cons of the Noibat line originally attributed to Kalos, and soon enough it was time for the other children to leave.

That evening, over a dinner of pasta and greens, Ash needed no prompting to talk about what happened after the children had run out of Lance's office.

"Gary wanted to see all of the others so we went back to my room," he said, punctuating his words with a cheerful stab at his tomatoes. "Mewtwo didn't really wanna deal with them so he practiced what Sabby taught us and made himself i-visible. Egg wanted to meet Gary and Anabel though, and Amber just goes along with everything because she likes having friends. Fossil annoyed Eevee a li'l. Program stayed in the Pokédex. Gary was real jealous that I had a Pokédex, too, but then he said that he was gonna get a Pokémon from his gramps that was better than Egg and Amber and Fossil and all of my friends combined, and I thought it was kind of weird first but I think he was just tryin' to seem cool."

It took Lance a second to register exactly what it was that Ash said. "Did Sabrina let you call her that?" he asked.

Ash just shrugged. "Her name is too long."

Lance took that as a no. "And she taught Mewtwo to make himself invisible?"

"Yeah, that was what happened yesterday," Ash said, nudging a withered spinach leaf around his plate. At Lance's meaningful glance, the boy sulkily forced himself to shove it into his mouth and worry on it for a second.

"How does he do it?" Lance asked.

Ash shrugged. "Somethin' about bending light beams. I dunno." Ash pushed his plate away. "Can I go play with the others now? Amber had an idea about how to make Egg even faster."

"Egg? Faster? Who would think?" Lance mused aloud. "If you think you won't need to eat anymore, you're free to go. No snacks later."

Ash furrowed his brow at that condition before eyeing the plate again. He pulled it back to him, shoveled the remainder into his mouth, and ran out still chewing.

Lance chuckled to himself as he continued to calmly eat his food, idly counting the seconds in his head. Exactly fourteen seconds later, Ash zoomed back into the room, Egg on his shoulder and Amber hot on his heels.

"Did you leave Program and Fossil to try and catch up with you again?" Lance chided. Ash looked abashed for a moment before his face split into an excited grin.

"Mewtwo said you wanted to tell me and Egg about something?" Ash said, bouncing on his heels. Egg squeaked in time with his fidgeting.

"I was going to tell you before you decided to run out," Lance said. "I was talking with Master Matis and he's more than willing to help you figure out a training regimen for Egg. The Lieutenant is known as Kanto's expert on Electric-types, and he's especially well-versed with the Pichu-Pikachu-Raichu line. If anything, he may be more excited than you to check out a Pikachu that's probably faster than his own Raichus were before training."

Ash tilted his head slightly. Egg mimicked the gesture. "Why can't you do that?" he asked.

"I could help you figure out a basic training regimen, probably," Lance allowed. "It wouldn't be anything special, though, and probably applicable to every Pokémon on the planet. I know all that there is to know about the Dratini-Dragonair-Dragonite line, yes, and I know the Dragon-type well enough to be able to train any member of it to my standard. I don't know enough to help you to that extent with Egg, or really any member of your family." Lance grimaced at this admission. "Matis can help with Egg in the same way that Sabrina helped with Mewtwo by teaching him how to finesse his skill and turn invisible and that Brock could help with Fossil. It will always be more beneficial to get advice from the Type Master of your specific Pokémon than try to get by with whatever basic knowledge any Trainer could give you at a certain point in their journey. Am I making sense?"

"Kinda." Ash thought for a second. "So it's like how Brock asked you for help with Aerodactyl? Because you know about it, but you couldn't tell him too much because yours isn't as Rock-type as his is?"

"In a sense," Lance said. "I'm sure that when Amber develops more, Bruno will also offer his assistance in honing her talent. I've also got to start training you myself."

Ash looked startled. "Training me?" he asked, dumbfounded. Egg leapt off of his shoulder and began chattering quietly to Amber, most likely enthused about the upcoming days of working alongside seasoned Raichus.

"Of course. You have to maintain yourself as a Trainer just as much as your friends have to maintain themselves as Pokémon. It's a mutual respect thing; if you're not putting in the work, then how could you demand it of them? Also, if you battle anyone outside of the Masters in Pokespeech and not in Universal, then people will call an unfair advantage. It's considered polite among humans to verbalize your commands such that your opponent knows what's coming. It's mostly a preventative measure; if a Trainer hid the fact that they were going to use a water-type move against a Charmander, for example, the move could potentially be so powerful that the Charmander's tail flame could go out, and that would be an entire mess and a half which could have been stopped by the Charmander being commanded to dodge with a second to spare." Lance held up a hand as Ash began to protest. "I know that you would never harm a Pokémon to that degree. You're different from a human in that you empathize with your Pokémon to that extent and would never demand such a move. It would be safest for you to hide that part of yourself by acting as a human Trainer might."

"What about things that aren't listed in the Pokédex? Like when Amber jumps up real high with her paw?"

Lance smiled at the memory. "Many Trainers come up with original move combos and give them custom names. In those cases, it's less knowing the move's identity and more knowing that the move is coming and preparing for it."

Ash nodded thoughtfully. "I'll try and come up with something," he said. Egg tugged on Ash's pant leg, apparently having run out of patience for their conversation. "Egg wants to know when he gets to meet the Lieutenant," Ash quickly translated. "He's calling him Sparky-sparky-boom-man. I don't think I should call him that, though."

"Sparky-sparky-boom-man?" Lance repeated.

"He says it's a very good title for someone to have. It's hard to really translate? It's like the crackling of the air before lightning and thunder in a storm, but as a man. Or a Pokémon, I guess."

"Best not repeat that to Master Matis; I don't think he will understand the implication," Lance said. "I'll be sure to let him know that you're ready to meet him. Make sure that Mewtwo continues his training with Sabrina so that you can all improve together. I would offer to introduce you to Daisy and see if she has any Water-aligned advice for Fossil, but I have the feeling she'd spent most of the time squealing over the fact that I have a child running around after me and also that there is a child on League property." He sighed. "I don't think she'd be able to stay focused."

"Who is Master Daisy?"

Ash's automatic respectful tone both amused and worried Lance. "Daisy is the Kanto Water Master. She's known for grace and precision, as well as being a bit absent-minded at the best of times. She can seem a little, er, shallow, but she is often far more observant than many give her credit for. She's also very good at getting other humans to underestimate her. It might be something that Fossil would be interested in learning about, but again, she would spend most of her time meeting you and proclaiming you the cutest thing she's ever seen."

Ash immediately wrinkled his nose at the prospect.

"Perhaps later, then," Lance said with a chuckle.

"Can I see Master Matis before saying yes?" Ash asked. "I can get Mewtwo to practice staying invisible by making him make me invisible too, and we can follow you around a li'l bit and watch him."

"You're asking for consent to sneak around," Lance deadpanned. "You have to be the first child under the age of eight to ask for permission to snoop."

"It seems rude not to?" Ash said, his voice lilting into a question.

Lance barely held in a laugh at Ash's bewilderment over human society. "I'll let you know when I plan to verify plans with Lieutenant Surge and you are more than welcome to shadow me during it."

Ash beamed before nodding. "Is that everything, then?" he asked. Egg quickly climbed back onto his shoulder.

"It should be. I want to go and speak with Mewtwo and see his improvement for myself, but you can run off first and I'll join you in a bit," Lance said. The words had barely left his mouth when he was blinking at the empty space that the three once occupied.

Lance sedately finished his meal, made sure that his dragons had their own dinners sorted, and headed down the familiar hallway, quietly conversing with the few Masters he came across on his way. Blaine had been slightly singed and mostly muttering to himself, barely able to keep up a basic conversation. Surge was still twitching at the notion of working with a Pikachu with more raw potential than what he'd ever been presented with. Brock had obviously been coming from where Lance was heading, and he gave the older man a nod of greeting and a quick rundown of how much better Aerodactyl had gotten after Brock started to react to her instincts, as well as showing Lance the Protector that Giovanni finally deigned to give to him. Erika had been meditating in a hallway, her Vileplume, Bellossum, and Roserade sitting around her and in the same trance. Lance hadn't tried to engage her at all.

Ash's eyes lit up when Lance walked in. "Finally! What took you so long?" he asked, flopping to the ground. Lance noted how much more comfortable he seemed without having to worry about others possibly intruding at any time.

"I ran into a few friends and wanted to talk to them, of course," Lance said.

"Other Masters?"

"Indeed." Lance looked around the room. "I assume Mewtwo is somewhere here."

' _You assume correct.'_ For the first time, Lance could hear a singular voice speaking above the echoes of implication that typically marked Mewtwo's speech. Were Mewtwo a human, his voice would put him at around Brock's age, though Lance had the feeling that had more to do with his mental maturity than his actual physical age.

"Did Sabrina make you work on that?" Lance asked, tapping his temple to specify.

Mewtwo nodded. _'The Guide wished to have a structured conversation with me. She claims that communicating through insights would never be nuanced enough to be able to display what one would want to show. It truly isn't too much more of a strain than basic communication is; as such, I am adequate. I apologize for any instances of misunderstanding between the two of us, though I would say that you, Fire-Drake, are far easier to communicate to than most. I commend you for that.'_

"Thanks, though I'm sure most of that is because I've been helping Sabrina since she was a very young child." Lance pulled a chair out from the table and sat at it. "Would you mind showing me what else you've improved on in training?"

' _Of course. I hear from the Dying-Flame that you were asking after a particular skill that I used to hide from his companions earlier. Why he is so fascinated with the two younglings, I have no idea. The Feel-Others in particular was tricky to work around; the Firebrand was less of a worry.'_

Lance knew that Mewtwo was aware of every human's name. His strange nomenclature was something very common to telepaths. Really, Mewtwo was doing nothing additional in how he broadcasted his thoughts, but he was adding additional neural signals that helped convince Lance's neurons to register the sensations as something solid, giving him an actual voice. That being said, according to Sabrina, the only way to signify separate beings was through a series of impressions and emotions that signified who that person was in your perception. There was no way that Mewtwo's perception of Ash matched what Lance's could ever be, and that was something that no telepath had been able to overcome. That Lance knew immediately who Mewtwo referred to wasn't typical, either; it took others a lot of work to try and piece together how a psychic might perceive of the person they were talking about.

That being said, Anabel and Gary were distinct enough personalities that calling them the Feel-Others and the Firebrand respectively made sense.

' _The Guide has been helping me work on all aspects of stealth,'_ Mewtwo continued. He crossed his legs and floated much more fluidly in front of Lance. _'That includes propulsion through the air, analysis of the room via others' thoughts, and, as the Dying-Flame was so excited for, the alteration of other's perceptions such that one can be ignored for a time. The Guide started me with the harder of the two exercises for that last bullet point. The easier method would be to ask another's mind politely to ignore my presence. If there were few enough people searching for me, then I could persuade them to never find me. It's much harder with larger groups, in which case I must bend light itself to try and remain unseen.'_ Mewtwo rolled his head around his neck and stretched his arms out. _'It's very difficult, though. It requires so much of my concentration that, as of right now, I can't be doing anything if I want to remain unseen.'_

"It seems like a good skill to practice with," Lance mused. "If you learn how to make it second nature, then you can strengthen your mental focus. It would be much easier to master other skills as you'd already know how to hone your concentration."

Mewtwo tilted his head to the side. It seemed as though Lance had forgotten how young Mewtwo actually was.

"If you keep practicing being invisible while floating or speaking, then there's a chance that you'd have the contorol t be able to apply your powers in whatever other exercise Sabrina gives you already," Lance clarified.

' _And you didn't word it as such previously, why?'_

Lance knew that the detached eloquence of his words wasn't completely on purpose, but he still sighed at it. "You psychics are far too good at acting more eloquent than you actually are."

Mewtwo narrowed his eyes. _'I don't understand.'_

"You don't need to bang your head against it," Lance said, waving off his curiosity. Mewtwo hesitated for a second before relenting.

' _That is most of what we have covered in our time together,'_ Mewtwo waved a hand dismissively. _'I believe that the Guide wants to cover telekinesis as soon as I have mastered invisibility. She says that it will feel much simpler once I master this trick. I do not think I enjoy thinking of them as tricks—it makes my powers seem much smaller. Less world-bending.'_

"Someone is getting a little full of themselves," Lance teased without any fire in his voice.

Mewtwo didn't recognize the hidden boast, it seemed, as he simply gave Lance a bewildered look.

"I was thinking about training Ash on how human society is supposed to work: Trainer etiquette, how to work on strategies, etcetera. Would you want to be included in that from a human's perspective or from a Pokémon's perspective?"

Mewtwo gazed blankly at Lance, though the man would have been a fool to think that Mewtwo wasn't thinking about the question. It was an odd question to ask of a Pokémon, normally, but Mewtwo had never acted as though he would be content to be treated as a Pokémon usually was.

' _It doesn't seem like a typical gesture, to be offered to be trained as a Trainer alongside the Dying-Flame,'_ Mewtwo mused as though he could hear Lance's thoughts. _'I cannot help but wonder if you have an ulterior motive for such a request.'_

"Honestly, it would probably be more mentally stimulating for you to experience training as a human would and more physically stimulating if you trained as a Pokémon would," Lance said. "You could easily switch between the two if you so desired. I want to maximize your training as well as Ash's, and you know yourself well enough to make an informed decision about your path in the future. I can't imagine Egg or Amber appreciating the nuances of what I'm going to be drilling into Ash's head for the next few years."

' _I need to be strong for the Dying-Flame. He is all I have left,'_ Mewtwo said. _'I will train as one of his for now. Perhaps he can in turn inform me of what he is learning.'_

"That works for me." Lance paused. "Why do you say you need to be strong for Ash?"

' _The Menace will come back for him,'_ Mewtwo said flatly, flicking his tail. _'The world is small and his reach too wide. The Dying-Flame needs to be prepared for that return.'_

"Menace?" Lance asked.

He blinked and suddenly there was the feeling of a presence, one that loomed and slunk around the room. There was something insidious in the air around him, a feeling of slowly sinking dread that faded into a deeper resignation to _something_ , a deep-seated despair that itself led to hopelessness. The presence loomed at the front of Lance's mind, omnipresent, omnipotent. Only Lance's innate draconic pride kept him from slumping to the ground listlessly.

And then the sensation went away. Mewtwo gave Lance an apologetic shrug.

"That was quite something. I feel like I understand, though I'm sure that I don't," Lance said, rolling his shoulders in an attempt to brush off the feeling.

' _The Menace is always waiting, always there,'_ Mewtwo said solemnly. _'No matter how hard we tried, he made sure that we were never strong enough. Now I can be. I can be strong enough to fight the Menace.'_

"And so will Ash, once I'm through with him," Lance said firmly.

* * *

"The most important thing to remember in battling is positioning."

Ash cocked his head to the side, closely examining the crude battlefield diagram that Lance had scratched into the dirt with a stick. They were in the very training grounds that Lance had been heading to when he found Ash; the other Masters were far more comfortable throwing each other around in the arenas that the League provided, so they had complete privacy to work. Ash had willingly brought his entire team with him in Pokéballs; even Mewtwo had come along in one, which surprised Lance despite what Mewtwo had decided about his training previously.

Lance tapped one of the boxes he had drawn on the short side of the battlefields. "This is informally called the trainer's box. In official matches, that is the entire space you can stand in during a match. Leaving it during active battle disqualifies you. Typically, more polished arenas such as the ones provided for the Indigo Tournament raises those boxes up a bit, but otherwise you will have to bear in mind that all of your moves must benefit you from this very spot. Putting up a Smokescreen may be helpful in limiting your opponents' sightlines, but if the Smokescreen drifts over your box as well, then everyone's going blind. In that case, your Pokémon should have a solid strategy that it can enact itself with the Smokescreen as a cue. Do you understand me so far?"

"Kinda," Ash ventured. "You keep saying stuff about formal things and official matches. What about battles?"

"Ah. I see that Lorelei has touched on that difference," Lance said with a satisfied nod. "Most Trainers don't differentiate between the two, as a warning, but we'll keep to the formal definitions in these lessons. In a match, the etiquette is to keep both your and your opponent's boxes in mind. Don't purposefully hurt your opponent simply to win. In a battle, all rules are off, and that's where positioning truly matters."

Ash seemed deep in thought.

"How about I show you what I mean?" Lance said mildly, unhooking several Pokéballs from his belt and activating one's expansion mechanism. "We're going to start from the very basics, though even as rudimentary as this session may seem you'll find that not many Trainers put any thought into this."

"This?" Ash prompted.

"We're going to be talking about the release of a Pokémon into a field," Lance said. "A match starts when a referee calls for a start. I prefer bouncing a Pokéball off of the ground and letting the shock open the Pokéball. That way, my Pokémon will materialize close enough to the ground for them to know that they should stay on the ground and wait for a cue." Lance flicked his wrist. The expanded Pokéball shot a few feet in front of him, bounced off the ground, violently ricocheted back into the air, and released Coatl, who calmly floated down to the ground and crouched forward into a ready position. Lance expertly caught the capsule he had thrown. "Okay, you try."

Ash furrowed his brow before fumbling with his collection of Pokéballs, which had just been stuffed haphazardly into his pocket. He looked at one carefully, expanded it, and threw it at the ground. The capsule skipped on the ground shallowly, releasing a rather discombobulated Amber who hurriedly caught herself from tripping as she fell out of the Pokéball. She then chased after it as it skipped along the ground rather than bouncing back to Ash's hand the way Lance's had.

The boy winced. "Sorry, Amber!" he called out, immediately chittering afterwards in the same apologetic tone. Amber jogged back to him to hand the capsule back, seemingly unconcerned by her less-than-graceful entrance.

"Let's practice that toss again," Lance said. "Think about how it'll rebound. Pokéballs are made out of an alloy of Aron cast-offs and midrange quality iron to ensure that the ball can't break, no matter how hard it's thrown by a human. It allows Silph Co. to make the shell for the Pokéball technology extremely thin, which should help you properly throw and retrieve it."

Ash uncertainly held the Pokéball up, hesitating.

"Think about how hard you need to throw it for it to come back to you," Lance said quietly. "It's not magic, it's not psychic ability, it's just physics and intent. If you throw it and want for it to come back, your body will comply. Especially yours, with your connection to Aura. Just go for it: throw the Pokéball and intend to catch it."

Ash took a deep breath, wound his arm back, and whipped it forward with a yell, flicking his wrist downwards as he did. Amber burst out of the capsule, only surprised for a moment at being released a few feet in the air before she whipped herself into a ready position and landed crouched on the ground. Ash didn't pay too much attention to watching her land, staring instead at the Pokéball that shot back from the ground as though magnetically drawn to his hand.

"Very good, Ash!" Lance called over, clapping.

Ash turned to him with a wide grin. "Did I do good?" he asked hopefully.

"You did amazingly. Getting the hang of throwing Pokéballs is difficult, though it may be a bit easier since you didn't rely on the crutch of manual release to begin with."

It took a second for Ash's brain to catch up, but his head whipped back around with a startled look. "Manual release?" he repeated, feeling the words out with his mouth for clarity.

Lance allowed himself a smirk. "Yep." He held up another Pokéball. This time, instead of throwing it at an angle, he held the release mechanism on its front down for the allocated three seconds. Red light flooded from the Pokéball and coalesced into the hulking form of Drakon, who managed to snarl in a friendly manner to Coatl. The latter Dragonite simply nodded in acknowledgement.

Ash looked shocked and almost mutinous. "What was the point of learning to toss it, then?" he asked.

"We're not talking about matches today, remember?" Lance prompted. "It's easy in a match to release your Pokémon calmly. In battles, it's a whole other story. The release button takes three seconds to activate—that's to prevent against accidentally releasing your Pokémon when you smack your belt too hard or something as trivial as such—and you might not have three seconds to spare to call in your reinforcements when there are people fighting all around you."

Ash still looked a little put out by Lance's omission, but he nodded a bit sullenly to show he understood.

"Keep practicing your throw," Lance said, stepping back. "Release your whole team."

Ash grumbled a little before grabbing another Pokéball from his pocket, winding up, and throwing it, deftly catching the capsule after Egg skidded to the ground, enthusiasm flaring before he realized that nothing too exciting was happening. Egg was followed by Mewtwo, who was followed by Fossil, and finally Program. The group of Pokémon waited patiently as Ash fumbled with the final Pokéball, trying his hardest to not leave his trainer's box.

"Very good, Ash!" Lance said. "This is going to be a little more challenging, now. To return your Pokémon, you need to hit them with the right Pokéball. Each one has been keyed to your specific Pokémon and will activate upon contact, no matter to where. Now it really matters where you throw and how you catch. Try it."

Lance had Ash run through the exercise of releasing and retrieving his Pokémon for a little while. Ash's party seemed a bit bored of the sedentary exercise, but as soon as Ash displayed full control over that aspect, Lance had the Pokémon running as soon as they left the capsule and had Ash attempting to retrieve them mid movement. It took quite a bit longer for Ash to master this, though that might have been because Egg seemed to revel in quickly changing direction right as his Pokéball was about to recall him. Even in the short time, Lance could see that Ash was starting to develop his own style: a slight flick of the wrist that sent the Pokéball spinning, a flourish when catching it on its return. The pace at which Ash was able to pick up on what Lance was teaching was startling. Lance had read Lorelei's summaries about how quickly Ash was able to understand the strategies of war generals and old Masters, but this was on another level from that, even. It took Ash a fraction of the time to conceptualize and apply what he was being told, and though he seemed slightly frustrated by his progress, Lance could tell that he was also starting to get a bit bored.

That wouldn't do.

Lance surreptitiously detached three of his own Pokéballs and circled around Ash. When the boy finally succeeded at predicting exactly where Egg was going to be and returned him at the first try, Lance snapped his wrists outward and threw all three Pokéballs at the same time.

The first bounced on the ground but then rocketed into the air. The team member he released was barely visible; it immediately dove straight at the ground in a dark blur and opened up a huge crater, sending shockwaves through the earth.

The second arced high in the sky and released another dragon that immediately flew as high as it could before giving a piercing cry and swooping down, summoning illusory copies and circling the two humans standing on the ground in a never-ending blur.

The third skidded against the ground slightly, releasing the final challenger in a crouching position. This dragon was the only recognizable one, though how Haxorus folded himself up so much, even Lance couldn't fully explain.

Ash froze, his eyes darting around at the new threats suddenly unleashed on him.

"Ash, stay focused. This is still a controlled setting. We aren't going to hurt you if at all possible, and if it does happen, we'll be able to heal you completely when we get back to the League," Lance said as soothingly as he could. He clipped the three Pokéballs back to his belt and picked out a couple more. "Matches are the official way to test your strength against each other. Trainers are protected by carefully constructed barriers. Audiences can watch freely. Matches are easy to learn, but we're not just learning how to fight in a match. I'm going to teach you how to battle."

Lance felt his inner dragon purr as he locked eyes with his charge, whose eyes lost all apprehension and gained the spark of _something_. "Your goal is to make me recall my Pokémon in whatever way you see fit. Of course, try not to get too badly injured. The battle starts when my next partner is released and ends when one of us has been knocked over by the other. I will count any direct hit made on a released partner as their being eliminated from the exercise and I will be slowly releasing all of my team members. My goal is to knock you off of your feet. Are you ready?"

Ash didn't even get the chance to nod as Lance was already releasing his fourth team member when he asked. "Gabite, cloak upon arrival! Flygon, disengage and disorient! Haxorus, move in and prepare to swipe! Drakon, to me!" Lance leapt up, arm outstretched, and was caught by Drakon, who swiftly gained as much altitude as he dared with the fragile human in his arms. Gabite shot out of the hole in the dirt he had dug and scraped his foot backwards, kicking up a swirling defense of sandy dust. Flygon chirruped at his order and slowed herself down, managing to fly sideways as she continued to circle around Ash in multitudes. Haxorus gave a snarl and bounded forwards, arms raised high.

Ash ducked his chin down and rolled out of the way, getting back up quickly. He leapt over another swinging claw and flicked his wrist—a Pokéball shot out of his hand and Amber quickly coalesced on the ground. She gave Ash a questioning growl but was quickly cut off when he made a strident sound at her and waved his hands wildly about. Her eyes widened before narrowing in concentration and then glowing slightly. Amber herself glowed red for a split second, and she darted forward quickly enough to fade from view in the next.

Amber dove through one of Flygon's copies, leaving an opening in the illusory boundary. She barked something out before curling in on herself, coiling up to spring away at a moment's notice.

Ash, for his part, didn't remain static. He dove through another of Flygon's Double Team copies and stood across from Amber, crouching low. His eyes sparked blue and his hands began to glow with an unearthly cyan fire.

Lance reached up and tapped Drakon with his Pokéball, recalling the dragon from midair. "Flygon! Aftershock, version 2!" he called out while in freefall.

Flygon screeched loudly, the sound given physical form as it flew through the air, knocking Lance closer to the ground. She immediately followed the Sonic Boom with a Protect bubble that she manifested around Lance that allowed him to crash down with minimal damage. He nimbly got to his feet just as Ash called out something unintelligible. Amber darted towards Lance in a blur, her feet glowing each time they touched the ground, bounding further and higher than she should have been able to. Amber barked out once before leaping up, aiming for Lance's shoulders. Lance took a step back and quickly flung another Pokéball out. This time it was Altaria who came out in a shower of feathers.

The Humming Pokémon sang out a strident sound that visibly rippled through the air, hitting Amber. The Riolu faltered and lost control of her leap; Altaria danced out of the way, shimmering red as he did so.

"Haxorus!" Lance called. The dragon dove towards Ash, who was just barely able to duck out of the way. He grunted; Altaria landed on his head, making him snarl up at the preening Pokémon.

"Stay focused, guys," Lance muttered more to himself, though he knew that his team would hear him. "Flygon, could you catapult Gabite out for me?" Flygon let out a chittering giggle before somersaulting in the air and slamming her tail on the ground. Tremors shook the earth, rushing under the surface to eject Gabite violently into the air. The Cave Pokémon howled his glee before slicing the air in front of him downwards in a Dual Chop.

Ash squealed before ducking again. He fumbled with the Pokéballs in his pocket before blindly throwing one out. It nearly hit Haxorus, who was obediently standing and waiting for Lance's cue. He grunted and moved his leg in time for the ball to bounce off the ground, and at a quick gesture from his trainer, Haxorus slid away backwards, his claws scraping grooves into the dirt, as Fossil scuttled into existence.

"Altaria, pick him up!" Lance called, ducking beneath Amber's insistent jumps. "Gabite, help me out over here, would you?"

Gabite seemed to take a slight to the blue Pokémon attacking his Trainer. As soon as he was given permission, he leapt at Amber with a snarl and batted her away, sending her reeling to the ground. The canid gasped a breath before glaring at the dragon and springing up. She launched herself at Gabite, an Aura Sphere forming in her paws. Gabite snorted and blew a tiny ball of energy at it, exploding the developing Aura Sphere and sending cyan sparks dancing into the air, before twirling away and landing squarely on his feet.

Amber seemed to panic, twisting as much as she could so that she wouldn't land strongly on one leg as she was aiming to do and skidding clumsily on the ground.

The ground beneath Amber exploded upwards; she barely managed to dart out of the way of another Earth Power Flygon had thrown into the packed dirt. Rather than the summoned spires of earth retracting back into the ground, Flygon slammed her tail into the ground once more and sent them flying into the air towards Ash, who was at that point frantically jumping backwards, away from Haxorus's outstretched claws.

Ash glanced towards Lance, as though to beg for a reprise without words. In response, Lance released Charizard, who immediately took to the air with a roar of exultation. The boy audibly groaned before fumbling for another Pokéball and releasing Egg with a burst of sparks. The Pikachu looked cross that he had been kept in the capsule at all but dutifully flared up in a shower of crackling lightning before darting off at a command. Haxorus grunted as he quickly backed away from the tiny sparkling comet that sped across the ground.

Altaria had long since abandoned his perch on Haxorus's head and had Fossil in his claws. The Kabuto was furiously flailing his appendages, attempting to rear back and hit Altaria with a Water Gun, but the Humming Pokémon was effortlessly twisting himself around, showers of droplets flying across the air. Altaria ended up casually throwing Kabuto into one of the divots that Flygon's Earth Power had made as they fell back down.

Egg checked on Fossil quickly before squinting into the air. The Pikachu snarled to himself before crouching down, a wide grin on his face. He jumped up, spun, and smacked his tail into the ground, throwing himself up a little higher. Ash shouted something else to him, and Egg complied by summoning a massive ball of pure electric energy and launching it at the ground, riding the shockwaves up in a much cruder version of Lance's Aftershock base technique. The Mouse Pokémon looked determined to ride everything all the way up to Charizard, but he had the misfortune of fighting against one of the Pokémon that had helped Lance create the technique to begin with. Charizard smirked before rearing back and unleashing a torrent of flames past Egg's head, disrupting the electrical waves that Egg was relying on. The Pikachu lost control over his trajectory, and with a shrill, panicked squeak, he went flying back towards the ground.

Lance had the thought to relent before deciding against it. There was no purpose to sugarcoating combat for Ash if he was going to start training, and he seemed to take to the exercise well enough. "Flygon, trap Egg where he lands," he commanded. Flygon trilled in acknowledgement before raising a glowing tail and slamming it into the ground. A small, loose vortex of dust and sand whipped up where her tail hit and swirled across the field towards Egg. The Pikachu squeaked in surprise before somehow coating his body in sparks and maneuvering it out of the way, dancing backwards frantically away from the swirling mess once he made it onto the earth.

He ended up backing up right into Haxorus's arms, who wasted no time in snatching up the confused rodent. Egg released a burst of electricity instinctually; Haxorus grunted in annoyance as Lance recalled him for being hit. Egg seemed smug at defeating his foe, but that was before Flygon swooped over to pick him up and hold him above ground. The Pikachu attempted to release himself in the same way as he previously had before realizing that Flygon wasn't taking any damage from the electric-type bursts. Ash tried to release Program, but it materialized in a pile of pixels that was only able to spew weak spouts of water at random. Lance merely had to release one of his newest partners, a towering tree of an Exeggutor, and instruct it to hold the immaterial Pokémon in place. Amber had frozen where she stood, allowing Gabite to sweep her up in his arms and start playing a macabre parody of catch with Altaria, the two twisting around each other as they tossed the Riolu back and forth against each other. Charizard had plucked Fossil out of the divot with his claws, casually holding him in such a way that all the Kabuto could do was feebly scrabble in the air.

Lance hadn't been idly standing by as his dragons immobilized Ash's team. He had perched on Charizard's back while commanding Flygon to grab Egg, and when he was within reach, Lance jumped off of the dragon's back and was able to grab Ash's wrists, preventing him from releasing Mewtwo to help them all. The boy flailed with a squeal, attempting to shake Lance's grip off to no avail.

"And time," Lance called. His team relaxed, immediately releasing their captives, and Lance returned them all with very little preamble.

He looked over the younger team. Amber looked dizzy and discombobulated from being used as a ball. Egg looked irritated at not being able to do anything to free himself. Program was a bit hard to read, but Fossil's fierce scuttling betrayed his own annoyance.

"Final time was two minutes and forty-seven seconds. Not bad at all," Lance said.

"That seems real short," Ash said, sulking slightly.

"Not at all. First-timers to this style of training rarely do better than two-and-a-half minutes; most usually last just over one. You've got an impressive base level understanding of what it means to fight. All we have to do now is shore up your instincts and make sure that how you react is the same as how you would logically want to act. That's much easier to teach than basic instincts. You'll be making it to three minutes in no time."

Ash scrunched up his nose at Lance. "I'm going to be beating you in no time," he vowed.

"No, you're not," Lance said. "Not this year, anyhow. Let's see if we can't impart some basic wisdom on you today. Are you ready?"

The boy grinned at the man before launching himself into the air with an exuberant, challenging shout.

* * *

 **Sorry for the lateness (again)—I may have gotten myself Pokémon Shield when I was about 1000 words from being done with the first draft (I've got boxes full of Sobbles from an ongoing Masuda hunt). Not sure if it's necessary to say, but Galar Pokémon are most likely not going to end up in this fic, at least where it stands right now (it's going to be pretty Kanto-centric for a good while yet). While writing this, I realized that the reason why I'm dragging my feet through all of this is that I have had quite a bit more exposition to set up before the real plot can begin, and that by choosing Lance as the limited narrator, I've limited myself a lot right now. That being said, next chapter is really when things start to get exciting, so hopefully it will be out much more quickly than these past two chapters have been posted.**


	6. Castling

**To the reviewer that requested nickname clarification: Amber is a Riolu, Egg is a Pikachu, Fossil is a Kabuto, and Program is a corrupted Porygon/MissingNo. Drakon, Wyvern, and Coatl are Lance's three Dragonites; Drakon is pure Dragonite (and Lance's official starter), Wyvern is part Hydreigon, and Coatl is part Altaria. Some other minor characters have nicknamed some of their Pokémon; knowing those isn't quite as important as knowing Ash's and Lance's Pokémon, but for those curious, Brock's Golem is called Aida, his Rhyperior is now called King, and Surge's two Raichus are Rai (Kantonian) and Chu (Alolan). Duplica also shows up in this chapter and refers to a Pokémon called .EXE; it's not too plot relevant, but she's referring to her Porygon there.**

 **To everyone who has been demanding that I update and otherwise cajoling me to finish the story (to the Guest who didn't understand why I didn't finish—it's because the story's not done yet? It's not marked Complete, is it?): please understand that I am doing my best to write as quickly as possible. There happen to be days in which I don't even open my laptop to do work, much less write fanfiction.**

* * *

During a lull in their spar, Lance briefly marveled at how much Ash had improved in a year. The crouched boy in front of him, eyes narrowed in concentration as they flickered back and forth, had emerged from the terrified shell that he once was. Lance had once thought that Ash improved rapidly in those first few weeks; he was rapidly proven wrong as a painfully naïve yet extremely intuitive mind slowly blossomed as Ash lost the excessive caution that had been drilled into him since his youth.

"I didn't think you were much of a thinker, Ash," Lance teased, whipping his cape out of the way as Ash dove for it.

"You've got a lot to say for an old man!" the boy jeered back, tucking his chin and rolling away to somewhat land back on his feet. Ash took two steps forward and launched himself into the air, his eyes flickering to a fiery blue for a second as he leapt higher than a boy his age should have been able to.

"You think your pretty little light show is going to help you?" Lance said, reaching out to snatch Ash from the air rather than dodge again. The boy let out an inhuman yowl as Lance grabbed him by the collar of his shirt, holding Ash away from himself as he smirked triumphantly at the pouting boy. "Don't be arrogant, Ash. What does Sabrina always say?"

"There's always someone better than you," Ash recited dully, swatting at the hand holding him in the air.

"Exactly." Lance poked him on the nose. "Now, do you want to try again with some company, now?"

Ash's eyes lit up and he immediately began squirming. Lance let go, letting his charge fall to the ground. Ash landed on his feet with a strangely feline grace and immediately darted over to where Ash had neatly lined his Pokéballs up. Lance made a mental note to teach him soon about portable Pokéball holsters.

Ash finally picked a Pokéball, ran back to the battlefield, and brandished it in the air. A yellow blur flew out of the trees to join him.

No manner of convincing managed to get Egg to truly adapt to a Pokéball. He was lucky that he was just a Pikachu and had the species-specific popularity to get away with being seen outside of a Pokéball. He seemed to favor hanging out on Ash's shoulder whenever he could. Lance originally worried about the shoulder strain that this could cause; Pikachu weren't exactly the lightest Pokémon, and Egg spent hours sitting on Ash. The worrying was been proven unnecessary by a physical that Bruno conducted six months after Lance found Ash. Apparently, the boy operated at peak fitness, which Lance had no way of explaining. Now he was working to convince Ash that he didn't have to just pretend that Egg was always in his Pokéball.

Ash and Egg's relationship fascinated Lance. Despite his obvious closeness to Mewtwo and strange protectiveness over Amber, Ash was clearly closest to Egg. He treated him as his first partner, the first comrade to call to join him. Of all of his friends, Egg was the most akin to Ash's starter and seemed to expect to be treated as such. Lance didn't know what it was that set him apart from Mewtwo and Amber, but Ash relied on Egg almost as much as he seemed to rely on Mewtwo's input.

Lance released a serpentine blue Pokémon that immediately screeched his glory into the sky, open maw gathering energy for a flash of pure energy that did nothing besides dazzle everyone's eyes. Whiskers flicking, the leviathan coiled in the air, slithering as though he was carving through ocean currents as his species was known to do.

Egg looked unimpressed at Gyarados's flamboyance. He was slightly more entitled to his arrogance now, having undergone a gruesome training routine with Lieutenant Surge and regularly keeping up with the exercises that Matis sent to Lance every week. Matis's excitement to work with Egg hadn't been unfounded at all, and now the Pikachu reveled in exploiting his teachings at every possibility. Lance had given up on trying to observe their training sessions; the bright, sudden flashes of light that Rai and Chu constantly emitted while Egg danced between their attacks gave him a migraine.

"Two-on-two, battle settings. We go until one is unconscious or detained. The first move is yours," Lance recited. Ash gave a firm nod, pointed at a spot he wanted Egg to start from, and took a deep breath.

The boy's feet lit up bright blue, and he sprang ten feet into the air, grinning madly as he began to descend. Lance smirked in response, reaching up to snatch Ash out of the air by his ankle. Right before he could have grabbed hold, Egg let out a lance of a spark that smacked Lance right in the palm of his hand. He recoiled instinctively, missing his target. Gyarados was able to knock Ash off balance with a well-placed Aqua Tail, but Ash simply grabbed hold of the appendage, gritting his teeth as Gyarados began to thrash around. The Atrocious Pokémon kept a thin veil of water surrounding Ash; Egg looked annoyed at this, as it meant that any electric-type move he directed at the larger Pokémon would be conducted straight to his beloved Trainer. Lance leapt towards Egg, trying to draw his attention away; the Pikachu immediately flashed into action, leaving behind small patches of sparks that rattled on the ground before sputtering out.

"Oh no, you don't," Lance muttered to himself. "Gyarados, shake them both off, would you?"

Gyarados gave a quiet hiss, flicking his tail to dislodge Ash (who quickly dove off of Gyarados with another Aura-powered jump to minimize injuries) and slamming it into the ground. Lance crouched down to wait for the mild Earthquake to pass, but Egg quickly lost his footing and tripped over himself. The ball of yellow fur had only managed to snort out an annoyed grumble before Gyarados turned and spat an Icy Wind at him. The Pikachu stumbled to his feet and tried to get away, but the intense cold that Gyarados had thrown at him had locked up his muscles, forcing him to run at what would be considered a normal Pikachu's speed.

Egg snarled in indignation at this offense, sending an arc of electricity towards Gyarados for daring to slow him down. Ash called out a warning (or something along those lines; Ash had never lost his instinct to revert to Pokéspeech) and Egg immediately calmed down, leaping towards his Trainer and clinging to his shoulder.

Gyarados simply blasted Ash and Egg with another Icy Wind. Ash backed up quickly, his hands held loosely in front of him and glowing in a cyan blue, while Egg stared intently at Gyarados with narrowed eyes. The serpent continued to blast cold air at the two, and Ash continued to nimbly dodge the worst of the attack, occasionally leaping backwards with a quick burst of energy towards the ground to move more quickly. Egg kept his eyes on the puffs of cold air; at one point, it looked like the air in front of him shimmered with a wavering translucent gold screen that Gyarados easily broke through with a weak, pinpointed Hyper Beam.

The young Trainer and his Pokémon didn't seem to notice Gyarados's master plan until Lance appeared behind the two and scooped Ash up in a bear hug. Egg quickly tumbled off, snarling sulkily as Lance held Ash in the air, his arms firmly clamped to his sides, feet not touching the ground. The Dragon Master made exaggerated growling noises in Ash's ear, ducking beneath bony elbows that were flung into his face.

Egg bounced around on the ground, trying in vain to find some way to free Ash without hurting him. His cheeks sparked in warning before a blast of electric energy flooded towards Lance, only to be stopped by a translucent green orb that materialized around them. Egg looked bewildered until he whipped his head around to glare at Gyarados, who looked amused. Egg tried to attack Gyarados's Protect screen for a couple of seconds before plopping down in defeat. The Pikachu stared up at Gyarados, grumbling in defeat.

By this point, Lance had exchanged his theatrical sounds for laughter, and Ash had flopped over in his arms in a mockery of unconsciousness.

"Okay, okay, uncle, uncle! Get off me, Lance," Ash said, slapping at his arms.

"As his majesty demands," Lance said with a snort, throwing Ash at the ground. The boy somehow twisted in midair to land on his feet, though he flopped onto his back anyways. Egg came over to sit on his chest.

"What did I do wrong this time?" Ash asked, scratching Egg behind his ears, much to the Pikachu's audible pleasure.

Lance nearly began listing off his observations before stopping himself and thinking. Ash peered up in confusion when his guardian didn't respond.

"I don't know if I like the look on your face," he mumbled.

"I was just thinking, why don't _you_ tell me what you think you did wrong?" Lance proposed.

Ash's eyes widened comically before he flopped back down, sighing loudly to protest the inconvenience of it all. "Oh, where to start!" he said. "I guess I was tryin'a look like I was showing off too much? Uh, I didn't need to jump that high at first, and Egg 'n' I somehow forgot that of course Gyarados would know Earthquake" (the Atrocious Pokémon looked smug at that admission) "so we didn't do the nullifying move that you spent so long teaching us three days ago, and we should probably have paid more attention to what Lorelei was sayin' about the body and temperature changes, and I guess Egg didn't get a chance to do a lotta fast things and I didn't get to do a lotta Aura things, but that was because we didn't give ourselves the space to." Ash looked up again. "Did I get everything?"

"Just about," Lance said. "Remember, self-critique is—"

"—the first step in self-improvement, I know," Ash said, rolling his eyes.

"Any more sass and we're going again," Lance said, raising an eyebrow.

Ash visibly winced at the thought of another intense spar. "Can't we just work on more techniques? Egg and I wanted to work on more deflection and Protect shields and stuff."

"Everything under 'stuff' is the most important part of that lesson," Lance said, shaking his head. "How will you learn if you don't take it more seriously?"

"By doin' it?" Ash asked, sitting up and inadvertently dumping Egg into his lap.

Lance sighed, recognizing the gleam in Ash's eyes. "I'm going to bury Samuel alive for introducing you to Gary. That cheeky runt has no business teaching you how to behave."

Ash grinned back as toothily as he could. Egg snickered.

* * *

"Well? How're the little rats doing?" Lieutenant Surge asked, the wine glass in his hand looking comically small, especially given that the man had downed its entire contents in one casual swig.

Lance swirled the contents of his own glass absentmindedly. "I'd request that you try not to say such things about my charge, but I doubt that it'd be effective," he responded. Matis had been the third Master to approach him at this year's meeting about Ash (covertly, of course; no one wanted to admit that they actually cared about a skinny child).

"They deserve it," Matis said with a snort, examining his glass for any trace of wine before handing it to a passing server. "Little turds spent all of last year making Rai and Chu chase them around. Rai's ready to redeem the beatdown that she's owed."

"I'm sure," Lance said. "They're very excited to challenge you again. Let me know when you're not beating Blaine's Magmortar to the ground and I'll bring them around."

Surge's grin became almost feral in excitement. "Good. I look forward to pummeling them into the ground." He bustled away, perhaps to tell his Pokémon about their upcoming reunion with their trainee.

Lance shook his head as he left, and when he turned back around, he saw a teal-haired girl wearing a long pink sweater with a blank face on it. She was grinning from ear to ear, eyes twinkling.

"Should I be frightened?" Lance asked.

Duplica barked out a laugh. "Absolutely not, Lancey," she said. She slyly pulled something out of her pocket. "I thought you might be interested in this."

Lance held his hand out for the tiny thumb drive that Duplica presented. "What's on it?" he asked.

"A little something for a little someone. I was doing some upgrades to .EXE and stumbled upon a really good line of code. Somehow completely morphed the shape and abilities of my guy. I know Mini-Kid's got a programmable Pokémon of his own who's facing some issues, so I thought he might want to try adding this to his projector. It might help stabilize the Pokémon." Duplica's typical amusement faded from her expression. "Lance, this file is pretty powerful, and given the latest improvements in technology, it's more than easy to copy it. I need to get this back as soon as you've transferred it to limit its being leaked. I trust you, but there's always the potential of a hacker or just a general thief. You understand."

"I do. Thank you for trusting me with this."

Duplica winked, twirled, and bowed, suddenly in a black cape, red jacket, boots, and red spiky wig. "But of course, Dragon Master," she said in a passable impression of his voice.

Lance snorted and refused to acknowledge this, moving on as Duplica sniggered behind him.

After approaching Sabrina with an update ("He refuses to refer to me as anything besides that horrid nickname. If I didn't find Mewtwo so fascinating and think that he's near the end of his training, I wouldn't want to teach them at all again," she said with a sniff, turning away. Lance had the feeling that she wasn't as firm in her resolution as she wanted to seem), Lance drifted towards the tables, resplendent with various hors-d'oeuvres, and began filling a small plate. As he turned away, he caught the eye of one of the quieter Masters.

"Master Lance," Giovanni said in a low voice. "Many of our peers seem captivated by one that they call your charge. I cannot imagine that you would have a child around you, especially one at the age that they insist he is, without informing me? I would have been very interested in introducing any child of yours to my own son, as well as helped mold him into as respected a Trainer as you or I."

Lance paused with a grape halfway to his mouth. "I'm sorry, Giovanni; it must have slipped my mind that you have a son around Ash's age. I didn't think to inform you or ask you for help as most of the Masters I have been working with on his behalf are simply Masters in the Type of his Pokémon companions. Anything else you have heard I can only say is speculation, as I haven't told many others about his existence. I don't see it as so huge of a thing that I need to send out a message to all Masters about it. Would you mind telling me about your son? I don't think I've heard much of him from you."

"Oh, Kamon? He's nothing too noteworthy," Giovanni said dismissively. "Eager to please, constantly begging for attention. He's been easier to control now that he has a Houndour of his own to amuse him." After a slightly too long pause, Giovanni hastily added, "And yours? What is he like?"

"Ash is very loving," Lance said, uncertainly noting Giovanni's demeanor, "and he takes insult very harshly. He doesn't like strangers too much and likes to seclude himself away in these days, though I don't try and force him to socialize as much as I used to. He has built up a solid circle of friends for himself, and he has his own Pokémon to train with as he wishes."

"Ah, you mentioned that earlier; is his name Ash?" Giovanni's lip curled upwards slightly. "How interesting."

Lance shrugged. "I guess it is. Not a very popular name, but he seems to like it enough." He noticed Daisy waving to him from behind Giovanni, Brock awkwardly standing next to her. "If you'll excuse me, it seems that I have a mermaid to please," he said wryly.

"Of course. You wouldn't want to get on a siren's bad side. I should know." Giovanni nodded to Lance as he hurried past.

"Lance!" Daisy cooed, hugging him the second she could reach the Dragon Master. "You don't visit anymore; the girls were _so_ looking forward to getting to see you again."

"Well, you've met the person taking up all of my time," Lance replied, giving Brock a nod. "How are the girls, anyhow?"

"Well, Violet and Lily are, like, as flighty as ever," Daisy said, wrinkling her nose slightly. "I swear, the only reason they're still Trainers is because we have to work with any new Pokémon we get to make sure they're ready for our shows. They do love teaching all of my Pokémon new, 'more beautiful' moves, so I guess I can't be too upset with them." A grin curled around Daisy's lips. "Our li'l Misty is getting ready to start adventuring for new Pokémon to try out. I wouldn't be surprised if she comes back with, like, half of the world's Tentacool. I'm pretty sure she's also secretly preparing to challenge me for my title one day, but we'll see how successful she is when she gets there."

"Misty? The little redhead that had two Staryu following her around everywhere?" Lance asked, gesturing by his waist to signify her height.

"She's a bit taller than that now, but yes! Those Staryu love her," Daisy said, rolling her eyes. "I swear, she bewitched them somehow. They spent their first two days with us soaking Violet as she tried to get them to listen to her and have since been crowded around Misty as if there's no tomorrow. She's just as fond of them, which is all the better."

"That sounds like how Forrest acts," Brock piped up. "He's been trailing me around, begging for a Rhyhorn of his own. It's cute when it's not annoying."

"Oh, but we didn't call you over to talk about _our_ squirts!" Daisy interrupted, looking sheepish. "As much as we love them, we wanted to ask about one of yours! Specifically, a little round-ish one. How is he doing?"

"As well as he could be," Lance said. "Perhaps he will always be a bit behind the others, but he is very diligent when it comes to improving."

"Of course he is, we trained him," Daisy said almost dismissively. "I might not have the experience with his species as Brock does, but if there's anyone who needs a good dose of creativity, it's him, and if there's anyone who can teach him that, it's me. After this year, I'm going to have him swimming in circles around the others on land."

"How is he going to swim on land?" Brock asked, risking a sidelong glance at Daisy and averting his gaze quickly when it didn't settle on her face.

The Water Master waved her hand dismissively. "That's for me to know and you boys to find out," she said.

Lance shook his head. Daisy's flair for the dramatic wouldn't ever be truly tempered, it seemed. He left the two Masters lightly bickering over the balance of dual-type Pokémon and which of their two types they would together make sure Fossil specialized in. Lance felt no need to join that particular debate. He had one final Master he wanted to speak with before retreating to his room.

Samuel Oak had never been a very extroverted man, though he was warm and friendly and easy to talk to. His genial personality was part of the reason why his fame as a Professor had grown—he wasn't only an intelligent man but also a caring man, known both for his impeccable research as well as his vast ranch where his sponsored Trainers left their Pokémon to be taken care of. It was perhaps a more symbiotic relationship than just that; any Pokémon left at the ranch were left there with the understanding that the Professor could use them as subjects for his research into Pokémon-human relationships.

The model was incredibly successful. Lance knew of many researchers who wished their work was as easy to modify.

At the moment, Professor Oak was speaking in low tones to Blaine. Lance couldn't quite make out what they were speaking on, and when they noticed him approaching, Blaine abruptly stopped speaking, nodding brusquely to Professor Oak before bustling away in a rush.

"I apologize for interrupting whatever that was," Lance said, gesturing at the retreating man.

There was an odd look in Samuel's eyes as he watched Blaine. "I'm not particularly sure what that was either," he said slowly. "Master Blaine had just run up blustering about a child and another Master and how we need to watch out for someone, but he seemed a bit… paranoid? He didn't seem sure of who to talk to about all of this. He's most likely going to approach you as soon as he gets all of the information that he thinks he needs."

Lance made a noncommittal noise.

"Was there something you needed?" Professor Oak prompted.

"Oh, right. I wanted to ask how Gary was doing—I've been getting a lot of nudges from certain people."

Samuel chuckled. "Ah, yes, my incorrigible grandson. He's a real peach, isn't he?"

"If peaches were crabapples," Lance said.

"Exactly. He's doing well enough; I gave him an egg on his seventh birthday to start generally teaching him how to care for a Pokémon. Blue wanted me to give him one of Charizard's kids like how I gave him one when he was younger, but I think I've chosen a better Pokémon for Gary."

"I assume that I'm not allowed to know which one," Lance said.

Professor Oak merely responded with a smirk that both his son and his grandson inherited from him.

Lance sighed.

"I assume that the children want to see Gary again," Professor Oak said.

"That is, in fact, a popular request," Lance said drily.

Samuel chuckled. "I'll see what I can do. Blue's been getting ready to challenge Giovanni for his title this upcoming year, so I find myself watching the little monster more often. He feels bad asking Yellow to help out, and even when she does, she's usually at the lab anyhow."

"Ah, that's right—how is Yellow doing, anyways?"

"Better." The Professor frowned slightly. "One of the other researchers has been staying with her. The two are as close as sisters at this point; it's quite refreshing to see. Delia has always been a sweet girl."

"That's good to hear," Lance said. "I'm sure that the kids would appreciate getting to see Gary again; it's been almost a month since they last saw him and a couple in particular have been getting a bit antsy."

Professor Oak nodded to him, and the two men made quick plans before saying their goodbyes.

* * *

"So what're we gonna do today, Lance?" Ash was bouncing on the balls of his feet, clearly excited to get started. "More dodges? More jabs? More work on combination moves? Oh, can we _please_ work on more combination moves? I swear that Egg and Fossil have one that'll knock your socks off!"

Lance patiently waited for Ash to run out of breath. "Before you get started again," he quickly said, cutting off Ash's next words, "we will be doing something that you're going to view as much, much more boring than any of that."

He watched Ash deflate slightly. "Oh. What are we doing, then?"

"Do you remember your first day of training?" Lance asked.

Ash deadpanned. "Please don't tell me that we're throwing Pokéballs again. I thought I learned all of that."

"You did—but we didn't cover where your Pokéballs go on your body. Now that you're comfortable with moving around and actually battling in both formal and informal settings, we can start talking about preparing for matches and battles."

Lance could see Ash starting to perk up again. "So, still talking about battling, right?" the boy said cautiously.

"Ash, when don't you talk about battling?" Lance asked, amused.

"Point. So?"

Lance opened the box he had brought with him. Ash scrambled over to peer inside interestedly. He began to pull out the articles inside and look at them, mildly baffled.

"Clothes?" he asked, sounding unimpressed.

Lance cracked a smile. "You don't seem enthusiastic anymore," he said. "Remember, your friends may never have to wear clothes unless it's an extreme emergency, but they're generally required in human society."

Ash looked at him flatly.

Lance reached over and took the folded shirt from Ash. "Let's take a closer look at this. These are traveling clothes, yes, but they are pretty high-quality since it's easier to learn about the best and then decide what aspects you personally care less about." He quickly unfolded the shirt and held it up. "What's the first thing you notice about this shirt?"

Ash furrowed his brow. "It's smooth?"

"Exactly. This is most likely partially made of Cinccino fur, which naturally produces and retains a sort of oil thought to be a skin treatment. While I don't know too much on that, it does provide the shirt a crisp look when put on." He handed the shirt to Ash. "Do you notice anything else?"

The boy looked at the white button-up. "The buttons look pretty standard, but there's no reason to get all fancy with those, I guess," he said slowly, poking around the shirt. "I guess it feels pretty warm, even though I'm not wearing it, but I don't think anyone would overheat in it."

"Excellent deduction," Lance declared, catching a proud grin from Ash. "There is some sort of wool in the cloth blend; I would assume Wooloo, as anything from the Mareep line would have static that's hard to comb out, no matter how much time you spend. There must also be some sort of temperature-wicking threads woven into the shirt. Again, I don't know too much about fabric engineering, but I would assume some of it comes from a member of the Cottonee line. Rest assured, none of the Pokémon mentioned would need to be hunted for this shirt; all of them would lose the fibers used naturally, and some are very willing to donate any of their excess. All in all, a relatively simple shirt that both looks good and feels good in all weather. I would still recommend wearing a coat when it's exceedingly cold or finding an even lighter blend for when it's exceedingly hot, but those are specific examples and not really considered part of a weather norm. You can choose to get a cheaper shirt that wrinkles easily, or has a much shorter temperature limit." Lance quickly refolded the shirt and set it aside. "What else is in that box?"

Ash seemed much more enthusiastic about this venture now. He quickly reached in and pulled out a pair of jeans. "These!" he said.

"Alright, start poking around. What do you notice about those?"

Ash looked hard at the trousers. He picked them up, rubbing the fabric between his fingers. "They're pretty thick. Still lighter than I expected," he commented.

"They're made of a much denser fabric weave, still probably Cottonee or Whimsicott. The thickness probably speaks to their durability while they're still temperature-wicking. Anything else?"

Ash frowned as he poked around the top of the jeans. "These pockets couldn't fit everything that's in mine. I don't think I like that," he said.

"That's going to be because most Trainers don't really carry all of their Pokéballs in their pockets," Lance commented, "but we'll get to that. The only things that a Trainer is expected to carry with them is maybe a wallet and a badge case, and even then, it's generally good practice to keep that in a travel bag or in an inner jacket pocket. As such, pockets on pants, while still large enough to fit some of whatever you may want, aren't too utilitarian."

Ash kept poking around, though the final details were more universal for jeans rather than specifics that Trainers' jeans were built with. He then reached back into the box and pulled out a cap.

"Nothing too out of the ordinary for that one, either. These hats are usually worn with the sun in mind; generally, Trainers prefer not getting the sun in their eyes, and they are able to soak up some amount of sweat on hot days. Just remember to keep it clean or else your skin won't be too happy."

The final item in the box was a leather belt, preset with six clips on the right side.

"What you're holding is perhaps the most important part of a Trainer's arsenal," Lance said. "That's what we call a belt holster."

"Belt holster?" Ash repeated, poking at the clips.

"Yep. This is a standard holster—all Trainers have permission to have six Pokémon available to them at all times. Trainers who prove capable of caring for more than that can get their limit extended, though the League is generally pretty stingy about giving those permissions to Trainers. The Masters you've been working with have all been granted permission to carry double that—we can all carry up to twelve. That's also to keep wishful Trainers on their toes; while we're known to use certain Pokémon, our actual battling parties can differ as much or as little as we want them to. It's meant to encourage Trainers to come up with strategies against our Type specialty or battle style rather than counters for our specific Pokémon." Lance shrugged. "Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't."

"So, I'm a standard Trainer?" Ash asked.

"As of when you turn ten," Lance corrected. "I wouldn't be surprised if you qualified for a three-Pokémon extension in your first year formally Training. You've still got a couple of years to go until then, so don't get too many ideas."

Ash's eyes glowed at the idea of having even more friends around. He didn't even seem to catch what those last words Lance said were.

"How does it work?" Ash asked.

Lance responded by taking off his own holsters and setting them on the table in front of him. "As you can see, holsters can be of many different shapes and sizes," he said, gesturing towards the gloves in front of him. It felt strange to be without them; even on days when Lance only had a few of his team members with him, he had his gloves on. "The belt is standard; most Trainers start with them. I still prefer using a belt holster when I'm not out on a mission or in the field. You gradually come to learn exactly what is more conducive to your style of battling. I found myself unable to completely twist around to grab some of my team members, which was unacceptable to me in a high-risk situation, so I had these made for me." He showed Ash the panel of six Pokéballs neatly grouped together on the inside of each wrist. "The clips react both to the inherent electromagnetism within Pokémon as well as the material that the Pokéballs themselves are made of and cling to them. It takes a bit of finger strength to detach them. Once you do, you treat them as you would any shrunken Pokéball. It's generally regarded as good conduct to put the exact number of Pokéballs on your belt as you have teammates; for you, for example, you might keep Egg's Pokéball on your belt even if he's out and about to signify that he is officially on your team rather than a surprise seventh team member."

Ash made a sound of understanding, though he still seemed a bit confused. He reached into a pocket and brought out the handful of Pokéballs that his friends were currently inside. As was custom at this point, Ash quickly let Egg out, reshrinking his Pokéball after the Pikachu crossly shook out the last remnants of stasis from his head and turned to his Trainer with an adoring look in his eyes. Ash absentmindedly started petting the Pokémon while looking at the holster.

"Just try it for now," Lance suggested. "Once we start training, you'll be able to vocalize exactly what you like and don't like about it, and we can talk about what other kinds of holsters you might prefer."

The boy nodded, satisfied at the suggestion. He began to carefully clip the Pokéballs available to him, including Egg's empty Pokéball. There was one space left after he was done, and he had made sure to put that farthest behind him.

"Starting from today, I'll expect to see you at least in that holster, at best in all of that," Lance said, nodding to the pile of clothes. "You might be used to your own clothes right now, but there could be a chance that you have to defend yourself with travelling clothes on, and I'd rather you prepare for it now rather than have to deal with it on the fly."

Ash nodded his assent, and Lance dismissed him for the afternoon. They would train on the combination moves that Ash so desperately wanted to learn about that evening, but Lance had a few things to take care of first.

* * *

Blaine ended up tracking Lance down near the end of the Masters' gathering. He looked terrible; his dark sunglasses weren't enough to hide the deep bags under his eyes and the fine silk shirt he typically wore looked crumpled and stained, as though he hadn't changed his clothes throughout the week that the Masters had been at the League. Lance almost didn't recognize the typically proud man, though he had heard of more Masters wondering his absence. Matis in particular had bemoaned that he didn't have the chance to pummel him into the ground.

"Lance!" Blaine hissed to him. Lance turned to see the Fire Master peering around a door, nervously glancing around the room to ensure that the other Masters hadn't noticed him. Blaine gestured for Lance to follow after him. By the time Lance had managed to sneak out unseen, the man had disappeared. A rectangular orange Pokémon that darted back and forth in the air gave an electronic chirp before whizzing down the hall, forcing Lance to jog to keep up with hit. The Heat-forme Rotom guided Lance through the League building and into Blaine's room. It hit the touch-activated pad on the door with a single spark, making the door splutter and swing open gently.

Blaine's room was as much a mess as he was. Lance was shocked at the change; the Fire Master had always been impeccably organized, books arranged in alphabetical order by author's last name, papers neatly slotted into manila folders, which themselves were inserted into large butterfly files that the old man dragged with him everywhere. When Lance first obtained his Charizard, at the time a freshly hatched Charmander, he had visited Blaine to ask after information on how to raise him. Blaine had merely had to walk to a specific bookshelf, pull out an overflowing file, and hand Lance the entire thing, filled with diagrams and papers and references to more esoteric tomes all about the Charmander line. Lance remembered asking him exactly why he was so meticulous in his filing.

Blaine had glanced about his study (bookshelves filled only with a countless number of those butterfly files, a single coffee mug sitting on a desk besides his large computer set-up) and shrugged. "My best explanation is that my surroundings usually reflect my mind. If I'm extremely frantic and stressed, I tend to falter in my fastidiousness." Blaine gestured wildly. "I've seen my research destroyed once before—I was grateful at the time, if you can believe that, and I still am grateful, to be honest—but that resulted in a lot of scatterbrained behavior, and my house was an utter mess. Thankfully, I recovered fairly quickly. It was a bit abnormal, truly; usually it takes me quite a few months to recover from such a mental state."

The room that greeted Lance was in complete disarray. Papers were thrown across every available surface, with small patches of floor visible such that one could teeter to the door if need be. None of Blaine's Pokémon had been released besides his Rotom; Lance assumed it was because of the walking fire hazards that he trained; his Charizard alone was enough to burn the entire League down without a single thought, let alone all of his paperwork. Some seemingly important papers had been pinned to the walls haphazardly, white paper stark against the dark crimson of Blaine's quarters.

"Blaine?" Lance called out hesitantly.

"I'm back here! Give me a second—" Lance heard some crashing from behind a door, and the Fire Master stumbled out of his bathroom. His round spectacles had been perched on top of his head, revealing bloodshot eyes, and there was water still dripping down his face. For the first time, Blaine looked extremely old to Lance. He blearily stumbled over, rubbing at his face. Papers crumpled under his feet.

"You look horrible," Lance said.

Blaine gave him a weary glare. "I'm no spring chicken but that gives you no right."

"I'm not even talking about your age. You look like a stampede of Tauros has been chasing you for a solid week and finally caught up to you," Lance retorted.

"Fair. There's more to that, though." Blaine maneuvered himself to his small kitchenette, dug out a bit of fruit leather, and angrily gnawed at it while turning to the papers he had pinned to the wall. He gestured for Lance to come over, snorting derisively as the Dragon Master took care to step over some of the sheets of paper scattered across the floor. By the time Lance had joined him, he had found some bit of charcoal in his pocket and was furiously scrawling revisions to the wall papers.

"Do you recognize this person?" Blaine asked abruptly, stabbing at a blurry photo with the charcoal. Lance examined the photo more carefully: it appeared to be taken from security footage, and its resolution was terrible. All he could really make out was a towering hulk of a man, someone with broad shoulders and a rigid posture that claimed authority.

"I don't know if I can from this image," Lance said.

"Look closely, Dragon boy," Blaine snapped. "Doesn't he strike you as familiar?"

Lance indulged the man another look. He observed the man's surroundings more this time: the lights were thrown behind him, obscuring his face even more than the camera quality normally would. It didn't help him elucidate the man's identity any further, and he told Blaine as such.

The Fire Master suddenly drooped, losing all of the wind in his sails. "Then there's no hope, at least for now," he muttered.

"Come again?"

Blaine leaned forward, tracing the outline of the man faintly with the charcoal he still held. "I never really knew who this man was," he said ruefully. "All I knew was that he was sponsoring my research. He would come, face obscured with whatever he felt like, voice altered by some technology, and demand results. We gave them to him because we didn't know any better. I left that lab after the funding ran out. A month later, I hear word that an associated lab exploded and burned to the ground and all of my data from the past ten years disappeared. I've been combing security footage and finally found this picture. This one picture of this man without anything to disguise himself, and yet I'm still unable to identify him."

"I'm really sorry Blaine, but why is this relevant to me?"

Blaine stared at the rest of the papers on the wall. "I can give you a few reasons," he said after a long pause. "One: my research was at the time was mainly in genetic material that this man claimed was from the legendary Mew itself, and how to manipulate it for a purpose. Two: you'll want to see this" –he carefully unpinned one sheet of paper and handed it to Lance—"perhaps scrutinize it before giving it back. Be wary of how you get it back to me; I don't want it traced. And third: I have every reason to suspect that this mysterious sponsor is at the very least tied to one of the other Masters with us this week."

Blaine ushered him out of the room immediately after that revelation, urging him to look over the paper in private (where Lance knew there weren't security cameras to pick up on their behavior) and speak with him again. Lance risked a glance down at the paper in his hands.

The very top of the form was labelled "PROJECT: TRAINER. FINAL ASSESSMENT."

* * *

Lance wasn't sure whether to be disturbed or disappointed that the assessment notes hadn't seemed too out of the ordinary or menacing outside of its title. On the whole, the paper was filled with detached notes on the subject in question: measurements of growth, results of endurance and speed tests, even down to the rate at which the subject's fingernails and hair grew. There was no physical description of the subject itself, but something about the way the paperwork was worded reminded Lance of words that he heard recited from a young boy long ago.

The last part of the report read _"Testing is proving favorable. Already milestones are being crossed leaps and bounds faster than previous to TRAINER's development. All other PROJECTS view TRAINER as center of world—exactly as planned. We (the life development team) believe that TRAINER will be ready for training come next week. Head of life development is optimistic. Further reports will be submitted by the training team."_

Blaine's spiky script and uncertain skepticism was unmistakable as well as the jargon that he used. Something began to crawl through Lance's insides, turning them chilly in one second and then sending them roiling the next. He didn't know whether he felt nauseous, upset, furious, or all three at the same time. All that he knew was that he would want more answers before returning to talk to Blaine.

And that left him where he was now, standing in front of Ash's room.

He knocked lightly before quickly letting himself in, as was his habit. To Lance's surprise, only Amber and the indistinct form of Program were in the room. He surmised that the others were off training in a separate arena, leaving Amber to juggle small Aura Spheres and Program to focus on trying to maintain a physical form.

Lance noticed Ash's Pokédex lying on a table. He took mental note to reprimand Ash later for not keeping it on his person before picking it up and plugging in the USB that Duplica had loaned to him. After transferring the data to the attached Porygon projector, he called Program over.

"Our resident Normal Master developed a new file that she thinks might help stabilize you more; would you mind taking a look and trying it out?" he asked. The sentient data whirred [happily?] before buzzing into the machine. Lance saw Program's form blink on-screen (a more indistinct pink-blue bird-like shape, fuzzier than a Porygon's should be) before the Pokémon manifested as a strange ghost-like figure in front of him. Program gave an 8-bit cackle as it managed to keep its form rather than suddenly phasing into a new one. Amber began to happily applaud the Pokémon as Program dove through the air, morphing through different shapes seemingly with ease.

"Glad that's working for you," Lance said. He was much more reluctant about his next task. "Amber, could I speak with you for a second? Is there even a way to?"

The Riolu gave him a look as though she were caught in headlights, but she dutifully walked over. "I've talked to Ash and Mewtwo but I was curious about your perspective. Can you describe your life pre-League?"

Amber went perfectly still. Her eyes were locked on Lance, startled at his request.

"You don't have to go into any more detail than you want to," Lance promised. "I learned something today and I wanted to compare a few things."

Amber didn't look convinced by Lance's vague reasoning (which was understandable) but she still plopped down on the ground. She glanced at Program (now a strangely solid mass of pixels) and crooned something. Program immediately whirred and threw itself at the Pokédex.

" _Of course, Master Lance,"_ a robotic voice played from the device.

Now it was Lance's turn to look startled.

" _Egg and I discovered this feature the other day,"_ Amber said through Program. _"It is quite useful, if you ask me. Program is much smarter than perhaps many take him to be and found a text-to-voice program in the Pokédex. He simply has to input what I say and, with some mild delay, you can hear it in your own tongue. But that is neither here nor there. Could you repeat your request, Master Lance?"_

"Just Lance is fine," he corrected automatically.

" _I'm afraid the expectations of my species don't allow me to call you Just Lance,"_ she said. Lance saw the amusement in the Riolu's expression.

"Of course." He cleared his throat. "I guess… would you mind starting from your name? Egg and Fossil and even Program are a bit easy to extrapolate, but Amber seems a little bit… perhaps, random? Random isn't the correct word—it doesn't quite follow the logic of the other names."

" _I do see what you mean,"_ Amber mused. _"Program was the first, programmed into existence. It is easy enough to code an artificial consciousness now. I believe Fossil came next, as the technology of revitalizing ancient remains slowly came about. Egg was after that—a study in the altering of pre-existing DNA within a fertilized Egg. The scientists used those experiments to verify what they already knew: that DNA and RNA and all that goes into one's biology are now mere toys, paints with which one can create the exact masterpiece that one desires._

" _Amber came next."_

"You came next?" Lance asked.

Amber shook her head. _"No. Amber came next."_ She seemed to emphasize the name.

"Aren't you Amber?"

A bark of rueful laughter. _"To be exact, I'm technically Amberthree. Amber herself was Ambertwo. Amberone was, to my knowledge, a little girl who died from a strain of the flu at the age of six."_

Lance felt his blood run cold.

" _From what I know, Amberone is completely unrelated to our story. She was born from a mother, nurtured by her parents, and died quietly in her sleep."_ Amber shrugged. _"Humans mourn such losses more intently than Pokémon do. I guess it's something hardwired within us to grieve for such a short time; nature is cruel in the ubiquity of its effects, after all. We all die, and in death we come anew. But Ambertwo was created because the head of life development was Amberone's father, and he mourned the death of his daughter far too deeply. He threw himself into the past rather than trying to look forward to the future."_

Amber snorted derisively. _"From what I recall, his-wife-Amberone's-mother left him after he became obsessed with the idea of bringing Amberone back to life. A week later, Ambertwo stabilized and began to grow. Before she could be connected to the others, she died. It became obvious to the scientists that they couldn't just take old DNA from a dead subject and expect to create something that could last. Even Fossil, whose creation process was most similar, has been stabilized with Cradily DNA, without which he couldn't exist._

" _So, they tried again. This time, they decided to focus on Amberone's aura._

" _It's surprisingly easy to extract aura, even if you don't know what you're doing. They managed to get enough aura to encourage self-sustenance and then they made it a vessel. One who was naturally good at manipulating and channeling aura."_

"You?" Lance said.

" _Me. Technically, I'm Project: Aura, but being composed primarily of another being's aura means that I'm technically more Amber than whatever non-Amber there was prior."_ Amber looked grim at that statement. _"I'd rather be acknowledged as mostly-Amber now."_

"But you aren't technically Amber herself?"

" _I mean, I_ am _Amber in many ways,"_ the Riolu tried to explain. _"I remember looking into the mirror and seeing a human girl with teal colored hair. I remember greeting my father with happiness and I remember how it felt to speak to humans and be understood. I remember hugging my stuffed animals and being tucked to bed by my mother. But I'm aware enough to know that those aren't actually_ my _memories. I know that if I tried to talk to you or Ash without Program, then it would sound garbled and unintelligible. It's probably stranger to hear it described than to live it."_

"It is, in fact, extremely weird to hear described," Lance said.

Amber smiled softly. _"Mewtwo and Ash thought so, too. After I was successfully created, there was one final Pokémon Project. This Project was one that was meant to outshine the rest of us. We were all tests to find out how to artificially recreate life from a simple DNA chain. There were countless other tests that failed, other Ambertwo-like creatures that didn't live for longer than a week, some who didn't even gain consciousness. Finally, the researchers created something stable, something viable. The scientists carefully built that DNA sequence from one that they got from who-knows-where, and they injected that into a Ditto cell and gradually nurtured it until it grew strong enough to reach out, searching for friends. When I met it for the first time, it was in our collective mindscape. Egg had been trying to teach us how to make electricity to no avail. Fossil and Program were just floating around. And we all heard this voice call out. We followed it to find a curled up Pokémon that neither I nor the other Ambers had never seen before._

" _He called himself Mewtwo."_

"Mewtwo," Lance repeated, more to attempt to stay on track with the story that Amber had poured out to him.

" _Mewtwo was kind enough, though uncertain of what to do. I think he must have seen me as Amber and not as a Riolu, as he asked me about how to work the radio and what a stuffed plushie was,"_ she said. _"He also asked what tears were, when one of the other experiments failed and we watched them fade away. He tried to understand everything about what being alive meant, and he was so concerned about his focus, his goal. He felt aimless. To be truthful, we all felt aimless. We had all grown up in this large blank space with no idea of what we could do. You can only run through six years of memories for so long; the others didn't even have memories outside of our abilities. We replayed Amber's memories so often that they no longer excited us._

" _And then Ash appeared, the same way that Mewtwo did._

" _Ash was different. Ash was loud and boisterous and wanted to know everything. He didn't have any old memories, but he knew how to speak and read and write and move immediately. He knew how to laugh and love and connect with us all. Somehow, we all knew that he was like Egg and Program and Fossil and not like me and Mewtwo. Ash was the first and only human to be created from scratch and somehow sustain himself. I suspect it's the vast amount of aura that pulses from his system."_ She shivered. _"Honestly, simply being around him can be intoxicating. Perhaps that is why so many humans flock to him._

" _Suddenly, Mewtwo and I had a focus. Ash wanted to learn how to speak to us, really communicate with us with his voice and gestures. We all patiently worked for hours to help him perfect some amount of Pokéspeech, as well as teach him how to access the aura inside of him to touch the others around him. Humans can't understand Pokémon normally, but we could replicate the connection that Pokémon have with one another by mimicking it with the aura that Ash instinctively knew how to wield. After Ash was satisfied with that, we followed his lead. He would invent games for us, he would run around with us, he was exactly what he needed._

" _And then we woke up."_

She fell silent.

"You woke up?" Lance said.

" _Yes,"_ Amber said flatly. _"I do not know if I can really describe what that was like. I was treated just like one of the Pokémon at that point, and we were treated well enough, I guess. Ignored, for the most part. It was Ash and Mewtwo that the other humans cared so much about. You should ask them if you're still curious."_

Lance debated on insisting that she keep telling her story, but something stopped him. No matter how fantastical her descriptions seemed, Lance had the feeling that there was a solid kernel of truth. There was no reason for the Riolu to make anything up; she could have just said that she was named for her eyes, or that it was an acronym for something mundane. To go into such detail about her old life to someone she had barely known for a year? Lance felt humbled that she felt comfortable enough to tell him as much as she had.

"Thank you so much, Amber," he said as firmly as he could. "I don't think I'll need to ask any more of you on that today."

The Riolu shrugged lackadaisically. _"As long as Program is around, I can answer questions,"_ she said. _"And I am sure that Egg or Fossil would be able to tell you as much. We are all very grateful that you took us in with nary a spare thought; Mewtwo has always said it was admirable of you to do so."_

Lance blinked. "It was the right thing to do," he said.

" _Not many good people do the right thing,"_ Amber said gravely. She growled something else, but it must have been an aside to Program as he didn't bother translating it. _"The others may return soon. If you have any further queries, they may be able to answer them. I'd like to go back to practicing my dexterity."_

"By juggling?"

Amber barked out a laugh again.

Lance watched her juggle four Aura Spheres for a minutes before deciding that their conversation was enough for now and that he wanted to take note of what he was told. He could easily return to ask for clarification, especially since his audience seemed more than willing to clear anything up. Lance bid Amber and Program farewell.

* * *

"Can you describe what this Project: Trainer was?"

Blaine stared at the steam gently drifting up from his cup for a second. "I wasn't privy to the entire plan," he admitted. "I was just a laboratory scientist, asked to take notes on what experimentation the head of the team conducted. It was simple enough; many of the Projects expired in the beginning, some before they even had the chance to develop. Project: Trainer was completed much faster than Project: Pokémon was, but that was because we had found a method that worked well enough in that first stage."

"Could you elaborate on what 'method' you're referring to?"

Blaine's gaze darted to Lance's. "I have your word that I won't be treated as colluding with these criminals?" he checked.

"Of course not. You are a Master now, and while that would normally be enough, you clearly regret your decisions. No court would want to throw you in with the rest of these scientists," Lance said.

Blaine relaxed slightly. "We figured out how to patch the broken DNA together, to improve it. Sometimes, it was finding a Pokémon of the same formal egg group to use as a base. Sometimes, it was knowing that another species had an exact trait that we wanted the latest Project to have. We spliced together extinct species easily, and I think once we managed to find the exact genetic sequence in Ninjask that gives them their blinding speed and coaxed it to activate in a Field-group egg. We toyed with life, Master Lance.

"It's a heady feeling, to know how to manipulate such things, to know what Mew herself might have felt while creating life. DNA is generally the same throughout all species of life, flora or fauna, and the minute differences mean a world of differences. One wrong base-pair change led to an entire Project needing to be scrapped. Projects fell apart after weeks of faux stability. It was so unbelievably stressful, and when all of our tests would come back positive for longevity as well as the results we wanted, we celebrated. So few Projects survived, but they were beyond comprehension in their survival. It was beautiful to witness.

"The first time I had the thought that something was off was in my third year working for the team." Blaine leaned back. "Our group was deemed 'life development.' Surprisingly vague title for the specificity of the work we were performing. I was generally too busy to think twice of whatever it was we were doing, but I remember specific memories standing out, or rather, a specific lack thereof."

"How do you mean?"

"Well, any scientist or researcher worth their salt would tell you that it feels as though funding is so precious and grants never-ending. I can reassure you that when I headed my own lab, my pile of grant applications never seemed to go away no matter how hard I tried. I never saw our team leader fill out a single grant application, and I never questioned where our seemingly unending funds came from. The day after one team member idly mentioned some device they had heard of that might help, it would appear in the lab. And yet, not a single paper or even a figure was published in all my years of working in that lab. None of it made sense. Why perform experiments if we weren't going to report on it to the world at large?"

"You think your work wasn't meant to target the scientific community." It wasn't a question.

Blaine looked blankly at the papers he had left pinned to his wall. The papers strewn on the ground had been hastily cleared away, but the haphazard bits tacked up were still there. "If it was, there was no need for the secrecy that I saw," he answered finally. "None of it added up. I didn't understand."

Lance followed Blaine's gaze to the papers. The notes scrawled on those pages seemed incomplete, half-finished. They seemed to be waiting for something to be added to them.

"Who was your team leader, anyhow?" Lance asked. "Surely they could explain to us further what was happening, or perhaps at the very least answer a few of your questions."

"That's the most insidious thing of all," Blaine growled. "I can't for the life of me remember his name."

Lance blinked. "Come again?"

Blaine stood up and walked over to the papers on the wall. "I must have known the man's name. He was a fiery, passionate person. We got along very well on a personal level. It couldn't have been a secret from me, but no matter how hard I try to remember his face or anything about him, I can't recall. His face is a haze, his voice a garble, and his name a complete mystery." Blaine turned to Lance. "This was all of two years ago. I left as soon as I was no longer needed, as I didn't want to be more involved than that. My memory is not horrible. I should remember that man. It's like there's a block in my head; only this past year did I even remember that I was part of these Projects."

The Fire Master looked furious. "Something's messed with my head, Master Lance, and I don't know what or who to trust anymore."


	7. Journal Entries

"I really appreciate you helping me out with this, Lance," the spiky-haired man said. "Honestly, this entire decision has been a little bit… out of character for me, I guess."

"Do you mean the part in which you got back from Kalos and sent me a frantic email at two in the morning about how to apply for Mastership?" Lance asked drily. "Yeah, I'd say that spontaneous late-night decisions aren't what I expect from you."

Blue shrugged, raising an eyebrow at Lance. "Yeah, yeah, laugh it up," he said, "but I was serious then and I'm serious now."

"I can tell," Lance said, glancing over the team registration form in his hand. The team that Blue had amassed was impressive, to say the least, and filled with Pokémon that the Master he was challenging didn't command. Refreshing. "But really? You're going after Giovanni's position? Somehow I thought Kalos would affect you to try and take Green's title from her."

"Green is a coward who hides behind the protection that her Mastership gives her," Blue sniffed. "I don't need to try and oust her to know that for myself. Giovanni's been a pillar in the Masters for decades, now; it would be far more impressive if I manage to finally topple him from that."

Lance chuckled. "I see. Out of curiosity, why is your Charizard listed as a possible back-up Pokémon?"

Blue leaned back in his chair, sighing loudly. "I love my old Kantonian team," he admitted. "They're dependable, well-trained, damn near can read my mind, but they don't quite fit the niche that I'm trying to fill. I didn't really know I _wanted_ to fill this niche until I visited Kalos and saw the true powers of the Ground-types that lived there. Giovanni focuses so much on sheer power that he doesn't seem to see the hidden potential in all of the clever strategies that any mid-level Ground-type Pokémon can carry out, y'know? Charizard's the only member of my original team that can come even close to understanding that power and knowing how to wield it himself." Blue made a slight face. "That being said, his species doesn't necessarily lend itself to the Ground-type. No matter how clever Charizard is, all he can really do is Earthquake selectively, if we're going to be honest. He's an easy go-to for any power plays I would want to make outside of battling as a Master, though. The others on my original team are more than happy just waiting for the next time I set out to travel. They're content staying on training grounds."

Lance hummed in acknowledgement. "Only a few Masters tend to keep Pokémon outside of their intended Type, perhaps because they can't devote as much time. Even fewer have unrelated Types in any roster, more to avoid conflict than anything. As long as you commit to the team here" – Lance waved the form he held—"you should be fine."

Blue gave him a toothy smirk. "Glad to hear it, Champ."

"Don't call me that," Lance said, almost automatically.

"Yeah, yeah, Mastership is a bigger thing," Blue said. He stretched slightly and stood up. "Seriously though, thanks for taking the time out of your day to review my paperwork. By the way, Squirt was babbling about coming by sometime. Pops gave him an Egg to take care of, and apparently, it's close to hatching. He wants to show off to your kid, I reckon."

"I'll pass the memo on," Lance said, neatening the papers that Blue had handed to him. "I'll process these for you; they should be ready by next week. Do you want to bring Gary by then?"

"That sounds reasonable," Blue said. "By the way, Duplica apparently found another Ditto in the mansion ruins on Cinnabar. She's debating on training it, I guess? One day, she'll just have a team completely of Ditto, and we will all flee from her army of thousands."

"Mansion ruins? I don't think I've heard of them."

"Really? It was a bit of a scandal last year," Blue said, looking at Lance oddly. "I guess Blaine didn't find it important enough to officially report to the League. Someone apparently heard a distant noise on the north side of the island. When law enforcement went to check it out, all they found were the ruins of what looked like a magnificent mansion. Locals were confused because they had never noticed a mansion there before, and apparently there was some sort of lab found in the basement that was completely burned down. It was blocked off to any but those with the highest clearance, as no one knew what the lab was for and thus declared it a biohazard. I think that Duplica might have been the first person in months to actually enter it. She mentioned that the entire lab seemed nonfunctional, though I heard she found an abundance of Grimer colonies that she ousted. Too bad Koga doesn't seem to want any more, no?"

"Indeed," Lance said. "Was there any sign of who might have used the facility?"

Blue shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine. You're going to have to go check it out yourself. By the way, you wouldn't know where Red disappeared off to, would you? It doesn't feel right starting off on this entire thing without getting to test myself against him one more time."

"He's become a bit of a mysterious type," Lance said. "I think he decided to go and work on getting Alola to officially submit a League. He might still be out there."

Blue let out a loud sigh that turned into a groan. "Damn it. He's so inconsiderate."

Lance flew to Cinnabar the next day atop Wyvern, who snarled as she saw the mansion ruins that Blue had mentioned. Her rider whispered for her to quiet before directing her to land at the edge of the forest that had almost swallowed the burned shell of a building. Wyvern insisted on staying out of her Pokéball, staying hunched over on all four limbs and crooning jaggedly when he tried to return her.

The mansion ruins still clung to the acrid smell of smoke, which tickled Lance's nose and made Wyvern grunt irritably. The first floor still held signs of its former glory: charred marble, cracked oak finishing. What appeared to be a fine rug was mostly scorched apart from one corner of its woven tessellation. Some misty rains must have washed away the ash and soot from the fire proper; though the mansion looked as though it had burned down rather recently, nothing exhaled debris into the air.

"This place is a wreck," Lance muttered under his breath. He hadn't been expecting a luxury hotel or anything, but the dilapidation could be described as sad at best. Wyvern gave a derisive snort of agreement.

"Do you think we'll find anything here worth looking at?" Lance asked his companion, kicking a shard of stone over.

Wyvern rolled her eyes at him.

"Yeah, yeah, I should focus on the work at hand," he muttered. He nudged a fallen pillar. "This looks more like decades of dilapidation than just a year or so of destruction, though," he said. "I can't imagine the amount of power used to destroy something like this. I don't even think you and the other two could do this much damage."

Wyvern narrowed her eyes. She didn't seem to appreciate his easy dismissal of the three Dragonites' power.

"You don't have to throw a tantrum about it," Lance said, poking her shoulder. "It's nothing to brag about, really. You don't have to be this destructive to be strong."

Wyvern snorted derisively.

Lance sighed before moving forward. He idly kicked a fallen roof tile, which skidded across the ground before apparently spilling over the side of something and falling through a hole somewhere. Lance heard the shard clatter somewhere far beneath him; curious, he asked Wyvern to see how the tile could have fallen down. She managed to quickly unearth a hole just large enough for Lance to fit through, scowling as she realized that she wouldn't be able to fit through as easily. Wyvern grunted before delicately tapping her Pokéball, returning herself. Lance quickly re-released her beneath the hole's surface.

"Anything interesting down there?" he called down to her. His voice echoed in the apparently cavernous basement.

Wyvern rumbled before lighting one of her massive claws up in a Fire Punch that she waved around like a torch. Lance noticed Wyvern stiffen, a low growl persistently slipping from her mouth.

"I'm coming down," Lance announced before leaping off the edge of the hole. Wyvern wasted no time in darting over and catching him on her back.

He patted her on the neck in thanks (she gave a huff of acknowledgement and reached over with her non-fiery claw to pat his hand in return) before digging through his pockets for a glass sphere full of Luminous Moss. He gestured for Wyvern to snuff out her claw before holding the small ball up.

The Moss glowed with an eerie light as Wyvern slowly began to drift further into the laboratory, flying through small shafts of sunlight so that the Moss stayed powered up somehow. Lance had thought that the single-use of the plant would be enough to fully investigate the mansion ruins; as he looked around, a sinking feeling in the very bottom of his stomach suggested otherwise.

As annihilated as it looked, it seemed as though this basement was once a high-tech facility. Machinery that Lance couldn't even begin to comprehend lay dormant on the ground, some still somewhat intact albeit with some spiderwebbing fractures on glass implements while others were strewn across the ground in countless pieces. Wyvern drifted over bundles of wires that looked short-circuited and frayed, rubber either corroded or peeling away to reveal hair-thin strings of copper. A strange orange trace was scattered on the ground, as though it had been suspended in some medium that splashed across the floor and dried up. Practically every surface was scorched or broken in some way, and Lance could see the shells of some computers that had been torn apart with nary a thought. Lance wondered if he could salvage some fragment of a hard drive to investigate what had happened before dismissing it as a fool's errand.

The entire basement smelled of mildew and rust, and Lance had the growing feeling that there wasn't much else to find there. He was mildly frustrated by this; he had flown all the way from the League to see if there was some evidence of a darker power rising in Kanto, and nothing seemed to be borne of it. Lance instructed Wyvern to make one last, somewhat slower loop, asking her to fly a bit closer to the floor as the Luminous Moss had lost almost all of its potency since being thrown into darkness.

In this last sweep, Lance noticed one corner of the room that had somehow mostly escaped the carnage of the rest of the basement. It was clearly a separate room at some point; the wall was falling apart and wires melted together into a strange pool of metal and rubber, and a desk had once sat at the corner where two walls met. The desk must have blown back and fallen over, as it lay on its side on the ground with, to Lance's surprise, a single scorch mark and not much else.

"Wyvern, let's take a look at that one," Lance said, pointing to the corner with the Moss.

The two descended, and Wyvern wasted no time in picking the desk up with ease. Something inside one of the drawers shifted audibly, and Wyvern quickly ripped that drawer out of the desk. She peered in but seemed disappointed at what was inside. When Lance reached in, he found a rather ratty, beaten up notebook.

He only needed one glance at a random page to find a familiar scrawl telling a haunting tale. Lance quickly shut the book and stuffed it into an empty pocket.

"Let's head back. I told Ash I would have a lesson ready for him this evening." Wyvern perked up at the mention of the boy and shot out of the basement, making herself a hole large enough with a deft Hyper Beam so that she could dart back, Lance balanced on her back and held in place within a Protect bubble.

* * *

Lance stared at Gary. In the year that he had known the boy, he had never been vibrating so violently as he was now.

"Just how many Pokéblocks did you nick from me?" Blue asked, holding his son down with a hand on his head.

Gary scoffed, pouting slightly. "Nunya," he muttered.

Blue flicked the back of his head. "Bratty kid," he said, glancing at Lance apologetically. "Sorry, Champ; didn't think I'd be delivering him on a sugar-high. I can see if Yellow's still down to watch him, if it's easier."

Lance shook his head. "Pallet's a bit of a ways away, and I'm sure that Ash will be able to tire him out enough anyhow. Feel free to leave him to run around with the other kids."

Blue snorted. "Alright then, you little scamp, get going," he said, nudging Gary. The boy smirked before running down a hallway, shouting down it, followed closely by a ball of brown fur with a cream ruff.

"I see that his egg hatched," Lance noted.

"Yep. They've been practically inseparable. It's sickeningly adorable." Blue let out a deep sigh. "I hate to admit it, but my dad was right yet again. Damn him."

"I would argue that Samuel being good at his job means that he can help you better," Lance said.

Blue waved him off. "Yeah, yeah. I'm assuming you're not going to watch the actual fight?"

Lance chuckled at Blue's lack of subtlety in shifting the conversation. "That's how they usually are. We Masters like to keep each other's techniques secret until exhibition matches and random spars. Hasn't Samuel told you how it is?"

Blue snorted. "Pops likes keeping his secrets as much as the next guy," he said before standing up. "Well, I'm just in time to be fashionably late. Smell ya later." As the man walked out of Lance's office and strode down the hall, Lance decided not to try and figure out what he meant by his parting statement.

' _Fire-Drake, the children desire a scrap and I haven't the knowledge on how to oversee it. They request your presence,'_ a familiar voice echoed in his head. Sighing to himself, Lance stood up and stared at the door.

"Well, where should I head?" he asked aloud.

A pause. _'They claim that they should be fine in the room. I am certain that any barrier I set up will suffice to minimize damages.'_

Lance stood up and strode down the hallway. His footsteps resonated strangely in the emptiness; Green had finally peeled herself away from the League mere hours prior, just missing the chance to tease her old rival, and the League buildings were almost empty for the first time in days. After knocking out of habit, Lance let himself into Ash's room.

It had taken a short while, but Ash had soon left his mark on the room. His clothes were either hung neatly in the closet or folded up in the dresser, though one rogue jacket was slung on one of the knobs at the foot of his bed. He had sequestered a veritable mountain of pillows to throw onto the bed; smaller nests of pillows where the Pokémon chose to sleep were not quite dismantled.

Of course, all of the Pokémon were now perched on various pieces of furniture—Egg on top of the closet, Amber on the table, Fossil from under the bed, and Program back in his normal spot in the television—as they stared at the newcomer in the room. Gary must have scooped his Eevee up and coaxed it to stand proudly on his shoulders, as it was currently attempting to balance itself by putting its front paws on top of his head. Gary didn't seem too bothered by the modification to his Pokémon's posture, standing proudly and surprisingly steadily.

Mewtwo was sitting next to Ash, who stared at Eevee with awed eyes. When Lance walked in, Mewtwo's eyes glanced over to his and the Pokémon seemed to sigh in relief. _'Thank the Creator,'_ he grumbled.

"Finally!" Gary chirped, noticing Lance walk in. He jumped up, bounced slightly, and folded his hands behind his back, blinking up at the Dragon Master. "Mister Master Lance, would you please consider refereeing this quick spar between the two of us?"

Lance stopped himself from laughing out loud at his enthusiasm as well as his humorously stilted attempt at respect. "Of course," he said. "What else would I do with my title?"

Gary nodded seriously, as though he could not think of any more important event. His Eevee might have also, though it was harder to distinguish if he did due to the boy's gesture.

"And Ash? Are you ready?"

Ash gave his own determined nod.

"Alright, challengers, if you could please go to opposite ends of your field so that Mewtwo can safely prepare the arena for you two. I declare this a one-on-one match with standard until-fainting rules. Trainers, you have five minutes to prepare your chosen Pokémon."

Gary immediately peeled Eevee off of himself and began giving the Evolution Pokémon an enthusiastic pep talk. Lance gestured to Ash to come over.

"No matter which partner you choose, keep in mind that in a match, it's only fair to call out your moves verbally and in Universal," Lance said quietly. "You may be used to acting on an instinct, but there's a chance that you could be accused of trying to distract your opponent's Pokémon. This is a test to see if you can successfully use your plain words to dictate what you want to happen and trust that your Pokémon know what you mean by extension. Do you think you can do that?"

Ash nodded again. He looked around the room for a proper dueling partner to Eevee before his eyes landed on a twitching, eager Pokémon.

It only took making eye contact with Ash for Egg to scramble off of the closet and in front of his beloved Trainer. He cooed up to the boy, cheeks already sparking in anticipation.

"Okay Egg, I know that Master Matis taught us a lot, but we're fighting Gary and his new partner," Ash said. "I want us to focus on basic techniques this time—Rai and Chu seemed to think that your power stores aren't actually ready for the bigger moves and said that we need to exercise them this way, so no complaining."

Egg pouted but reluctantly nodded. He liked the big, flashy moves, Lance guessed.

Ash began to whisper into Egg's ears, the Pikachu nodding fervently in agreement to whatever he was suggesting. Lance backed away to allow the boys to plan on their own. Gary was giving his Eevee an equally enthusiastic pep talk, though the vulpine Pokémon seemed a little more confused about what he was saying.

"Alright, Trainers!" Lance called out after a couple of minutes, clapping loudly to get the boys' attentions. "If you could please stand at your side of the arena?"

Ash and Gary hurried to the sides closest to them in the little rectangle that Mewtwo had erected. Egg and Eevee dashed into the field, standing before the boy they were championing confidently.

"This will be fought until one Pokémon falls unconscious or the match itself is called. We shall begin in three… two… one!" Lance said, crisply slicing his hand down in front of him.

"Egg, go! Set up the field with a Thunder Wave!"

The Pikachu squeaked—his cheeks flared with sparks and he slammed his tail against the ground, allowing the sparks to ripple outwards from where his tail hit.

"Eevee, quick! Use Sand Attack so that you can walk!"

Eevee spat out a mewl before leaping up, scattering dust across the floor. The Thunder Wave seemed to awkwardly skitter; its concentric circles disrupted by Eevee's move. His attempts didn't seem to be completely successful though, as Eevee landed on top of a current that moved erratically towards him. The Pokémon winced in pain, limping on the paralyzed foot.

"That's it!" Ash encouraged. "Now, Nasty Plot into Thunder Shock!"

Egg sniggered under his breath, looking at Eevee with a sinister gleam in his eye. A second later, an arc of electricity shot towards the affected Pokémon.

"Get out of the way!" Gary said. Eevee's paw shifted and he almost turned illusory as he shot to one side with a Quick Attack. Egg's Thunder Shock careened into the ground, drawing the Thunder Wave towards it before dispelling the entire attack.

"Make a Wish, Eevee!" The Pokémon closed his eyes, glowed briefly, and called out loudly as a shimmering halo around him dissipated. "Now, Covet on Egg!"

A sudden naughty gleam came to Eevee's eyes, and he darted towards Egg intently, paw outstretched.

Ash went to call something out but hesitated for a second. Egg looked over to him, uncertain of what to do, and Eevee took the distraction to bowl straight into the Pikachu.

"Egg, Electro Ball!" Ash said frantically. Egg nodded to him before screeching again, drawing electric energy to himself. The energy began to coalesce into a tight orange ball that crackled as it rolled onto the base of Egg's tail. The Pikachu leapt up to throw the Electro Ball on top of Eevee.

"Eevee, dodge!" Gary tried to command, but the move was slightly too fast for Eevee to avoid, even with the boost that Quick Attack might have given him. The Pokémon wailed indignantly, shaking off the final crackles of static that raked through his fur.

Eevee shimmered slightly once more, the dancing light stripping away a good deal of the sparks. Lance noted that Samuel must truly have bred his grandson's companion to perfection, much like Ash's had come trained for—

"Double Team! Spread out!" Ash recovered somewhat slowly to the realization that Eevee had healed himself back up. "Once you're ready, go in for a Quick Attack!" Egg barked out in recognition before sliding himself into an array of illusory copies that surrounded Eevee and began to run in a clockwise circle around the Pokémon. Eevee looked nervous, glancing towards Gary helplessly. The boy was staring at Egg's many copies with intensity before a slight smirk cracked his mouth wide open.

"Sand Attack! Aim for his back!" Gary called out.

Eevee squeaked before kicking a foot out and sending a spray of dust that clung to only one Pikachu's fur. Egg grumbled at being sussed out so quickly but changed his trajectory to send him careening into Eevee before he could take advantage of the failed Double Team. Eevee had the instinct to slide into Quick Attack and dart away this time, leaving the two Pokémon to chase each other around.

"Try Electro Ball again," Ash said, biting his lower lip.

Gary snorted slightly. "Dodge it with Quick Attack again, Eevee!"

Eevee gave an assertive squeak, preparing to leap to the side with a single fluid burst of speed, but the muscle spasms from Egg's earlier Thunder Wave came back suddenly and the Evolution Pokémon collapsed on the ground. Egg gave a victorious screech as he flicked his tail and threw the crackling ball right at Eevee's back. He landed deftly, prepared to spring out of the way of Eevee's immediate counterattack.

Eevee wailed plaintively upon impact, flopping onto his stomach on the ground. He didn't get back up, though he kept making tiny mewls of discomfort.

Both boys blinked.

"Eevee? Can you get up, bud?" Gary asked cautiously. The petulant pout that Eevee shot at him in response somehow conveyed both an insulted pride at Gary's lack of faith in him and a spoiled plea to stop working.

Ash shrugged. "Let's just call that a draw," he said. Lance chuckled at the olive branch that Gary immediately accepted, walking over to pick Eevee up to comfort him. Egg growled out a complaint at the match being cut short but was easily placated by a scratch behind his ears.

Lance wondered vaguely why all idyllic times felt foreboding to him now. The singed journal he had found in the laboratory ruins burned in his inner jacket pocket.

* * *

Tracking the other Masters down after their typical get-togethers was much harder than it seemed. While most were supposed to be at their chosen Gyms during the League season, they usually tended to keep a communication device and a Teleporter on their person and do whatever they felt like. It had apparently only blown up in one Master's face before; Green and her Wigglytuff had floated slightly too high for her Gym attendants back at Chrysanthemum Island to reach her, and it had taken her an extra hour to handily destroy the impatient challenger.

Of course, Blaine was somewhat more predictable than the Fairy Master.

Lance directed Drakon to dive into the caldera of the volcano, ignoring the rundown Gym shell that Blaine had left in town as a hint for the most intrepid challengers. He didn't attempt an Aftershock landing; there was far too high a possibility of Lance landing in seething magma, and it was incredibly easy for Drakon to casually land, unperturbed by the extreme heat. Blaine wasn't in sight, but his Magmar partner watched from a pool of lava that sat in the middle of the makeshift battlefield that Blaine had constructed. Lance nodded to the placid Magmar, who nodded back before closing his eyes and settling into the comfort of molten rock.

"Blaine? I've got something to show you," Lance called out to the empty air.

"Is that so? Then answer me this, Dragon Master Lance," a booming, enthusiastic facsimile of Blaine's voice said, the sound echoing across the circular chamber.

Lance rolled his eyes in response to Blaine's theatrics.

"If you please—how many Pokémon evolve via use of a Fire Stone, and which exactly are they?" Blaine's voice asked, question ending with a sharp intake of breath as Blaine waited for his response with bated breath.

Magmar rolled his eyes and gurgled from his pool, sinking in further as if to escape his Trainer's embarrassing security system.

"Four," Lance said. "Eevee, Pansear, Vulpix, Growlithe. Now—"

"Very good!" Blaine's voice cut him off. "There are two more questions in this impromptu quiz, and then, we shall see as you truly are!" A canned thunder effect sounded.

"Blaine, you need to update your questions, you've asked me the same three things for the past few years—"

"Question two!" Blaine's voice paused dramatically. "Name all extant Fire-type lines found in the Sinnoh region, circa Cynthia's reign!"

Lance was rubbing at his temples now, trying to alleviate the headache he could sense growing. "Trick question. You could always find the Chimchar and Ponyta lines, but due to a series of treaties with Kanto, Cynthia was able to introduce Eevees to Sinnoh, making Flareon also a viable Fire-Type found in that region. Blai—"

"Excellently stated! You're on fire today!" A low-quality drumroll began to rumble in the volcano. "Final question! The! Last! One! Make it count, Dragon Master Lance! Now! What was the team that the last winner of the Master's Cup used for his victory?"

"Gothitelle, Gardevoir, Talonflame, Garchomp, Gyarados, and, most notably, a Pachirisu. And before you ask, he works in ACE as a strategic commander now." Lance tapped his foot. "Are you done?"

"Well done, Dragon Master Lance! You've made it past the quiz and to the next part of the trial! Now prepare—"

The voice was cut off as Magmar, who had finally decided that he was perturbed enough by the sound, spat out a bead of fire that shot through the air, and hit something on the wall with pinpoint accuracy. Lance could see the slightest of sparks shoot from a neatly severed wire as the voice stuttered into a stop.

"Magmar, you really need to stop destroying my technology whenever you feel like it," a much more muffled, grumbling voice said from Lance's left. "I can't keep replacing everything just because you decide you don't like it anymore." Blaine was carefully making his way up a staircase hewn into the wall of the volcano.

"In his defense, it was getting a little grating," Lance said. "Not to mention, you haven't updated your aerial security questions in quite some time."

Blaine snorted. "I don't need them to be updated. I need it to stall whoever managed to get into this place from the air long enough for me to gauge if it's worth talking to them or not."

"Wouldn't Magmar just do that?" Lance asked. Magmar snickered in agreement, still sunk deep into the lava.

"Don't give him an even bigger head," Blaine grumbled. "Why were you looking for me, anyways?"

Lance held the journal up. "Does this look familiar to you?"

Blaine froze, staring at the object in Lance's hand. "N-no, but it feels like it should," he said, walking over cautiously. He took it from the Dragon Master, examining it closely, rubbing a finger over scrapes in the leather and dusting off the ash that coated it. He slowly opened the cover, flinching as he recognized his own handwriting.

"Where did you find this?" Blaine asked, his voice monotone.

"It was in the ruins of a laboratory on this island. Blue mentioned it when he came by to ask me to look over his forms before submitting them, and I was curious enough to investigate. That journal was all that was left."

Blaine turned a page, then the next, and the next. Lance watched as he quietly put the journal into his pocket for later scrutiny. "It's strange to read something in your own hand and have no memory of writing it," he said after a long pause.

"I wouldn't know," Lance said.

Blaine gave him a withering look. "I can't tell what these notes are on. It's baffling me, and I hate being baffled. I'll be working on this for a little bit. I'll send a note." Without another word, Blaine turned and left the arena. Lance watched him walk away before calling Drakon to him again and taking off into the crisp air.

* * *

It was fortunate for Lance that Sabrina decided that she was going to drop in to work with Mewtwo the next day. Blue had planned to bring Gary when he came by later for yet another test, and Lance arranged with Scott for Anabel to come by to amuse Ash while Mewtwo was called off to another room in the Sabrina went in to join Mewtwo, he recounted what Blaine had said about the journal and what it might mean.

"He didn't remember writing in a journal of research that wasn't more than a decade old?" Sabrina said. "How very peculiar, especially for Blaine."

"Do you have any idea how that might happen? You'd know best out of anyone," Lance said.

Her hair started to gently float a bit higher as she thought about Lance's question. "It sounds to me like a vast memory block, though to mask even the very context that Blaine would need to understand his own work is incredibly difficult," Sabrina said. "I'd postulate that the psychic to do so was either vastly powerful or trained to do such things. I wouldn't be surprised if both power and finesse was needed."

"It could be done, though?" Lance said.

"I'd say so," Sabrina said slowly. "I haven't done anything to that scale, but I would say that I've performed a similar procedure. It's surprisingly simple, actually. If one were to know the exact memory one wanted to cover up, it would be nothing more than focusing on that memory, layering false memories on top, and sealing any threads that might lead to that information off. They might not have even blocked off his entire memory of that time; he might have been led to believe that he had a different position on the same project, one that gave him less clearance to know what he did. Blaine is intellectually a genius, Lance. There's very little he couldn't figure out. His memory was most likely manipulated on any sort of recent work that he remembered having a strangely menial position on. He has long since outclassed any sort of assistant work."

"Would finding those threads and trying to loosen them up be the best way to get to the blocked memory?"

"I'd say so, yes." Sabrina's hair fell back into place and she carefully floated herself back down. "I'm off, now. I'll be done when Mewtwo returns to you."

"Of course," Lance said.

The Dragon Master had made it down to Ash's room when he burst out of it, Gary close behind. Egg was balanced on Ash's shoulders while Gary's Eevee chased after the boys. Anabel came flying by afterwards, her own Eevee dutifully following behind.

"And where are you all off to?" Lance muttered under his breath, deciding to follow close enough behind to ensure their mischief was kept at a minimum.

The three children burst into an arena that Lance kept up for Ash's training. After a few minutes of general scuffling and muffled shouts, Lance felt vaguely certain that nothing too dastardly was going to come of the children and left to finish up some last few notes.

Lance ended up inviting Blue, Gary, and Anabel to stay at the League for dinner before going home. Rather than cramming into Lance's office, the group filed into a somewhat less used room across the hallway to eat whatever had been prepared for them. Lance watched Ash listlessly poke at his salad, eyeing Gary warily. Gary, for his part, was wearing a smug, wide grin. Anabel looked mortified.

Blue cleared his throat. "Gary? Anything you want to share with the class?" he asked, spearing a segment of roasted tamato berry and popping it into his mouth as he stared his son down.

"Not much, Pa," Gary said, poking at a bit of tamato berry on his own plate after watching his father eat one. "Just that Anabel likes Ashy."

Ash dropped his fork on his plate with a loud clang and immediately turned bright red. Anabel had her head in her hands. Lance thought he could hear her quietly squealing to herself.

"Is that so? Why do you say that?" Blue asked, nonchalantly prodding at another bit of food and pointedly ignoring the other two children.

Gary gave Blue an incredulous look. "Can't you tell?" he asked, gesturing towards the reactions his two friends made. "Also, she gets really weirdly excited that Ash knows which Eevee is mine and which is hers. I think he likes her too."

Lance had never quite appreciated how frank children were.

"Why do you say that?" Blue repeated with a hint of the smirk that stretched across Gary's face.

"He likes holding her Eevee for her," Gary confided. "And he gets really red about it all."

Ash and Anabel both looked away from each other. Both were staring at the ground as though it would swallow them whole.

"Isn't that sweet, Lance?" Blue said, openly smirking now. "They're so sweet, aren't they?"

"Of course," Lance said dispassionately, focusing on cutting one particular piece of onion into smaller and smaller pieces. "Very cute. Just like you and Green used to be."

Immediately, Blue's expression sharpened and he glared at Lance. Ash perked up slightly at the familiar name.

"Green? Like the Fairy Master?" Ash ventured.

"Oh yes," Lance said. He examined one bit of onion skewered on his fork. Blue's eyes seared into his head, demanding that he stop talking. "Samuel's told me that he thought she and Blue here held a flame for each other at one point. They apparently would pick fights over nothing simply to talk to each other. Very charming. Of course, now that it's little more than childhood rivalry, she's been wanting to have her own daughter meet Gary, here."

It was Gary's turn to narrow his eyes at Lance.

"I've heard that the girl goes by Leaf," Lance said. "She's apparently as stubborn as Green herself used to be, and she's got a vested interest in Steel-type Pokémon. I think Green's considering getting her a Mawile or some other non-Kanto native that she's more familiar with to get started. Nothing but the best for her little girl." Lance looked up, finally looking at the two Oaks at the table. "I could very easily convince her to bring Leaf over the next time that the two of you are here, if you'd like."

"Absolutely not," Blue said flatly.

Lance shrugged, sneaking a wink at Ash and Anabel, who both giggled at the dusty pink that both Gary and Blue's cheeks had turned. "Option's always open," he said mildly. "Should I ask for dessert to be brought in?"

* * *

Lance had a brief meeting with Sabrina after her lesson with Mewtwo. The Oaks had long since left, and Beheeyem had flashed into his office, nodded to Lance, and whisked Anabel away.

"I've been pondering what you've told me earlier. Though I don't formally know who your literal-figurative example is, I began to slowly inform Mewtwo of a postulated procedure to locate and manipulate a placed memory block. He seemed very proficient in it—he understood what I was describing immediately and was able to replicate my results with minimal effort. It seems his mental exercises are doing him well."

Lance hummed. "Would you trust him with another's mind?" he asked.

Sabrina shrugged. "More than most, but it's a good rule of thumb to not trust your mind to an outside influence," she said. "I'd say he has the delicacy to be able to attempt dissolving any theoretical memory block and the good sense to not try it unless absolutely necessary."

Lance nodded, deep in thought. Sabrina patiently waited for him to word the next question that he was thinking of. Before he could ask it, the door burst open, a light flashed, and Ash ran in, Egg on his shoulder, Amber at his heels, and Mewtwo anxiously floating after them all, lowering a series of invisible protective shields with a blink of an eye.

"Hi, Sabby," Ash said, grinning up at her.

Sabrina narrowed her eyes at the boy. "Hello, scoundrel," she said, her voice a steady monotone.

"You sound really creepy talking like that," Ash said.

"Ash, be polite," Lance interjected.

Ash shrugged his apology.

"Can I help either of you, scoundrel or student? Or, perhaps, a member of your motley crew?" Sabrina flicked Egg's cheek. "Perhaps, this little rat?"

"Mewtwo mentioned that you're starting to teach him high-level things, and it got me thinking," Ash said. "Why don't you try to teach me what you're teaching him?"

Sabrina froze, stunned into stillness. "I don't know if I follow you," she said.

Ash tapped his foot impatiently. "I know there are rules for matches and rules for the League. That's all fun. It would be super cool to be able to talk to anyone on my team with just my mind, though! Imagine the strategic advantages that would give me!" His eyes shone.

"I don't have to imagine, as that is mainly how I communicate with my team members," Sabrina said. "You do realize that Mewtwo would be able to establish such a link in those situations during which you may want that skill? It doesn't do for a single member of a large unit to hide an ability from others, and it isn't advantageous to have more than one specialist of a niche skill such as psychic ability."

It finally occurred to Ash that Sabrina was saying no and he began to pout. "But it would be _so cool_. And Anabel said she can do it."

"Be that as it may, I cannot hone the power if it is not innate within you. That Mewtwo has such a strong connection to his well of power bodes well for any team the two of you are on together; you have no need for such nonsense in your head." Sabrina paused. "And I would like to reiterate that my name is Sabrina. This past year may have shown you incapable of remembering that, but I'd like for you to at least try."

Ash grumbled as he left, ushered out by Mewtwo who blinked them out of existence before closing the door behind them.

"He seems to like practicing his skills," Lance said, gesturing to the party's disappearance. "That was practically instantaneous."

Sabrina nodded in agreement, staring at the closed door. "He is a wonderful pupil. If only his Trainer were more inclined to put in such effort at remembering how people prefer to be called." She turned her gaze back to him. "He insists on calling me that horrid abbreviation and not the name that I'd like for you to use."

Lance shrugged. "He's a stubborn kid. I can't explain him."

Sabrina wrinkled her nose at that. "What were you asking after before that rude interruption?" she asked.

"Ah, right. I was curious how refined Mewtwo's technique had gotten," Lance said.

Sabrina gave him a probing look, her eyes briefly glowing blue. A year of interacting with Mewtwo had made Lance sensitive to a mental touch, and so he could feel Sabrina carefully sifting through his thoughts in search of something. His motivations? His considerations? He wasn't quite sure. Sabrina seemed satisfied after a couple of seconds and withdrew.

"Well, yes, he would be able to do what you're thinking of," she said. "I would normally caution against it, but he would perhaps be the most suited for such a task, both in terms of mental power and prowess."

With that, Sabrina released her Alakazam and they teleported out. Lance sighed and steeled himself for the strange conversation he was about to have.

* * *

 _'What?'_ Lance noted that Mewtwo had gone stock-still.

"It sounds difficult, but doable based on what Sabrina has told me," Lance reaffirmed.

Mewtwo seemed thoughtful for a second. _'I suppose. It doesn't feel... foreign to try. I feel strangely certain that this will be simple for me.'_ He examined a hand, holding it out for his own perusal. _'I don't know why I believe so strongly in this, but my body is aware of what I must do and I will be able to complete it fully.'_ He turned his gaze to Lance. _'Why is that?'_

"I couldn't tell you," Lance said with a shrug, "but perhaps that will be Blaine's first bit of research to perform after this. Are you ready?"

Mewtwo nodded, choosing to remain silent.

It took less than five minutes for Mewtwo to carefully peel away the mental blocks built in Blaine's head and quickly disguise himself when the man burst into a sitting position. He seemed alarmed and overwhelmed.

"Blaine? Is everything alright?" Lance asked, drawing Blaine's attention to himself.

"It's... how did I not remember any of this?" Blaine said under his breath, leaning forward and clutching his head. "It was such a short period of time and yet, I could never forget any of it. I was too fascinated by the sheer mad genius of it all to be scared away." He got up, stumbling almost drunkenly over to his travel bag. He immediately tore it open, pulling out everything inside with a desperation Lance had never seen in him before. "I need- I need a notebook, a pencil, a pen, anything at all to dictate all of this. It's- it's all madness. Horrible, unending, captivating madness. It's not all back, but it's going to be, I can feel it." Finally he found a sheet of paper and a writing implement and started to furiously scribble onto it.

"If you don't mind me asking, whose madness?" Lance ventured.

Without pausing for a moment or looking up from his erratic note-taking, Blaine said, "Dr. Archibald Fuji. A twisted, brilliant man. A smear on the name of science itself." He paused what he was writing and scrawled out some lines on the corner of his sheet, cutting it off and handing it to Lance. "That's where he lives now. His work in genetic engineering and the state of the consciousness is truly remarkable."

The shabby home in Lavender Town that Blaine had directed Lance and Ash to did not impress either of them. Lance couldn't imagine a renowned scientist working out of such a rundown house.

Ash perked up as they walked up to the building. "I hear a lot of people in there," he said.

Lance looked over to him, puzzled. "I don't hear anything, Ash," he said.

Ash huffed. "Well, you might not recognize some of them, I guess," he said. "They're hard to miss, though."

Lance didn't reply to that, though he tried to be more attentive.

An older man with no hair, a pair of round glasses, and a tightly styled beard answered. "Yes, may I help you?" he asked. His eyes widened upon seeing Lance; the Cubone in his arms jumped down and ran further into the house.

"Hello, I'm Dragon Master Lance of Blackthorn. Do you think my ward and I could come inside? This may not be a conversation one wants to have in public."

Dr. Fuji seemed confused but simply agreed, saying, "Yes, yes, don't want to disturb the neighbors. Be mindful of your feet; the Nidoran are most likely roaming."

Lance and Ash walked into a Pokémon paradise. The walls within the home had all been knocked down, completely opening up the floor plan. The floor was portioned off into different kinds of terrain: grass, carpet, hardwood, stone, and water all ran through the ground. There seemed to be a tree made of plastic that held baskets currently filled with berries that one of the many Murkrow that fluttered around the room picked at. Lance didn't realize how large the house was until that moment; Ash's shining eyes spoke to his excitement at seeing the space.

Dr. Fuji had been carefully studying Ash the entire time that he and the Dragon Master had entered. "I'm Archibald Fuji, as I'm sure you know if you're here," he said, gesturing the two of them over to a counter of the kitchen built into the stone section of the house. "Please feel free to take a seat, and I can quickly get you a glass of water. I've got nothing stronger to offer to you, I'm afraid, Master Lance."

Lance waved away the offer, graciously accepting a glass that Dr. Fuji proffered. Ash took one too, had one gulp of water, and promptly begged off to dart away and find the Nidoran that Dr. Fuji had mentioned before. The man mentioned someone who might help Ash and the boy immediately ran off to find her.

"So, Dr. Fuji," Lance said, sounding out the name. "Might I assume that you recognize my ward?"

"I haven't the faintest idea what you are talking about, Master Lance," Dr. Fuji replied calmly. "All I see is a boy overjoyed at the prospect of meeting a new Pokémon. Nothing too out of the ordinary for children his age."

"I'm not here in any official capacity, Doctor," Lance said. "At least, not quite yet. I have no intent on persecuting you; if what a former colleague of yours tells me is true, you were not strictly responsible for what I believe you are. Unless proven wrong, I will not be pursuing any legal course of action against you. I simply want to know if you know who Ash really is."

Dr. Fuji jerked slightly upon hearing Ash's name, though he was able to quickly cover it up. "Ash," he sounded out. "I never said it out loud myself, I suppose, but I did hear plenty of those higher up in administration calling him such. To me, he was simply another test. Another experiment." Dr. Fuji studied the glass in front of him. "I'm not a good person, Master Lance. When my daughter... well, I couldn't go on, and this was right around the time in which someone within the government's medicine sector discovered Ditto. With such a creature, any Pokémon could be duplicated, they hypothesized. What makes us humans so different from Pokémon? In the long run, it's only a handful of DNA pairs that differs us from nanab berries. It shouldn't be difficult. I obsessed over this hypothesis, and I became convinced that I could bring Amber back to me."

Lance dared not to speak, to interrupt the man.

"At one point, my wife told me that I couldn't do it, that she couldn't watch me do it. She didn't want to have her hopes raised only to be dashed, she said, and that I forced myself through the pain of losing our child over and over again worried her. I thought once that she would leave me. She nearly did when, one day, a mysterious benefactor contacted me.

"He was a businessman, he claimed. He was curious about unlocking the mystery of life, and he was willing to provide me all of the funds and resources I thought I needed if I would extend my experimentation with Ditto into an ancient DNA sample that he had. He didn't know what creature it was, he told me, and he wanted to see it in the flesh. I thought the task impossible and thus the job stable and lucrative and immediately took it. I told my benefactor that I would first clone Amber with his money so as to not ruin his limited DNA stores. He agreed readily. He just wanted his product.

"Finally, I did it, or so I thought. I could see my little girl in front of me, asleep standing up, and she was beautiful, just as she had been. One of my scientists, a man from Pallet Town who had studied under Professor Samuel Oak, had the idea of connecting her life source to a Pokémon sensitive to such energies. He spoke of his heritage and affirmed that it was possible." Dr. Fuji stared into his glass. "I'm ashamed of how far I went now. At the time, I imagined that my daughter would simply be connected to the Pokémon as her partner, a connection that went so deep that it tied the two together infallibly. It was to be a fail-safe.

"It was rather obvious to me that my benefactor wanted me to clone a Pokémon, one to serve him. The amount of purview he wielded was... shocking, to be honest. He had four executives checking in on me on a monthly basis to ensure that work was going well enough, but he himself would never visit the laboratory. He wanted to see the final product, not bore himself with the in-between stages. I never questioned it; I just wanted my funding so that I could have my daughter."

A Rattata ran up to Dr. Fuji, nuzzling at his legs. Sighing, the man patted around his pockets and found an oran berry to hand to the scavenging Pokémon. "Melanie is usually quicker to catch one of the runaways. I apologize."

"Not a problem at all," Lance said. "What sort of Pokémon were you asked to create?"

"Not one I recognized, I can tell you that," Dr. Fuji said, relaxing into his chair as best as he could now. "And the sample was incomplete, as well. Not degraded or anything, just not something that I could have duplicated. It eluded us for years. Somehow, it transformed before our very eyes, and our results on one day would be worthless to us the next. Frustrating, I can tell you.

"Blaine finally cracked it one day, though."

"Blaine did?" Lance asked.

Dr. Fuji nodded gravely. "Brilliant man he is and was, he came up with the idea of not just building a fetus but acquiring a mother for it and having it birthed. I can't remember what other species of Pokémon we defiled for our causes, but soon we had a fragile, new child.

"Our benefactor returned immediately upon hearing of our success. At first, he was greatly displeased of what he perceived to be our failure. We did not duplicate the Pokémon he wanted; we had created a new species altogether, one that he did not recognize. He nearly had my throat torn out by a massive Persian that accompanied him until, again, Blaine stepped in. He had greeted the man with some congeniality, though I cannot remember his name, and seemed shocked that he would go so far as to threaten a life. We had plans to stabilize our new life-form in the same way that I had stabilized Amber, and perhaps it would take that additional step to have the DNA manifest.

"That worked. I don't know how it did, but the Persian stopped suffocating me and the man seemed pleased. He stepped away and instructed us to provide him a Trainer for his creation. A human who could stand beside this Pokémon as its equal."

Lance heard Ash cry out in excitement before squeaking out in Pokéspeech.

"At this point, I didn't care who this man was. I wanted to be done with the project so I could bring Amber home to my wife. The scientist who first proposed tying a Pokémon to a human's life, Matthias, I believe, provided his and his wife's DNA for the experiment. We were able to build a stable egg that hosted their samples and slowly built what was meant to be 'the perfect Trainer'. He was a dark-haired boy with strange marks on his cheeks, an effect of the way he was conceived, we hypothesized. And we tied him to the creature that already began to grow as soon as their link was created.

"We nurtured the two of them for months, years. My wife diligently stuck through it all; we had an older daughter, one who did not perish in the accident that claimed my Amber, and my dear wife devoted herself to raising her. They still live here with me, as well as the strays that we have opened our doors to. Meanwhile, I was playing god to children and Pokémon trials that we had undergone to ensure that our DNA replication process was foolproof.

"When the boy was around three, we decided to wake him and the others up."

Dr. Fuji's hands started shaking, and he gingerly placed the glass down. "Most of our tests dissolved away. I can't explain to you why it could have happened. The pressure was off, one calculation misread, one chemical added where it shouldn't have been. I don't know. A good half of our creations dissolved away, and of the remaining half, only a handful ever gained consciousness. I watched my little girl die for a second time, right in front of my eyes. And that's when I finally broke. I couldn't do it again. I couldn't try and make Amber manifest only for it to catastrophically fail. Our benefactor whisked away our other creations, forcing their compliance with his Nidoking, Nidoqueen, and Rhyperior, and promptly dismissed all of us. I came back to Lavender Town, to my knowing wife who helped me grieve one final time, and raised my daughter to love and cherish every Pokémon that has wandered through our doors. That was almost five years ago now. I never saw that businessman again, and I hope I never will."

Lance nodded slowly, examining his now empty water glass. He opened his mouth to ask another question when Ash burst in, tailed closely by a Bulbasaur, an older teenager following after them both.

"Lance! Lance! Bulbasaur wants to come with us! Can he? Can he?!"

Lance sighed deeply, all too grateful for the chance to slide back into Ash's much simpler world, free of the baggage of moral dilemma and scientific inquiry. "As long as Bulbasaur is okay with it, I don't see why not. You're in charge of making sure the others get along with him, though."

Ash nodded fervently, his eyes shining. He turned to Bulbasaur and began to excitedly coo at him in Pokéspeech. The squat Pokémon looked upon him with adoration already in his eyes.

"I'm so sorry, Father, I tried to warn him that you might be busy with your other guest," the harried-looking teenager said, glancing at Lance in awe and apology.

"It's no problem," Lance said. "I just hope that he wasn't too big of a hassle."

"Oh, not at all! The little ones love him," she said. "I've never seen them so excited to see a human. I've also never seen a human actually communicate to Pokémon. That was a bit surprising."

"Our visitors are special, Melanie," Dr. Fuji said. "Is there anything else you need from us, Master Lance?"

Lance thought for a second. "If the name of that man eludes you, then I can't think of anything in particular. Again, I don't intend to persecute you for anything we have spoken of, though that investor may need to be tracked down if possible."

"But of course." Dr. Fuji stood up. "Feel free to come by whenever you feel the urge. I'd imagine that Bulbasaur would welcome the chance to visit his friends here again."

Immediately upon returning to the League building, Ash and Bulbasaur ran off to introduce the latter to the rest of Ash's party. Lance had to shout after them to remind Ash to formally capture the Seed Pokémon, though whether or not the boy heard him was a different question altogether.

A few details about Dr. Fuji's story had bothered Lance immensely. Blaine had described Dr. Fuji as borderline psychopathic, a monster who was willing to do whatever it took to come up with results. The man that Blaine remembered was far off from the man that Lance had met, the one who had completely remodeled his home to better suit the strays that he had welcomed in. It could have been that Blaine had only seen the horrific side of Dr. Fuji, but Lance had a suspicion that the same figure that had forced a mental block onto Blaine might have inflicted one on the doctor, erasing truly unconscionable aspects of his decisions to perhaps protect him or someone else. There were few people who could have unlimited access to such powerful psychics outside of the Masters, and Lance couldn't think of any who would also feel interested in genetic research. Even if he were to consider the Masters, who would want to fund such a project, and who would have the resources for it?

Lance pulled out a sheet of paper and slowly wrote down the names of his colleagues. Brock and Lola were immediately out; they were far too young. Dr. Fuji had described a man, which eliminated Daisy, Green, Sabrina... Lance felt like he was staring at another at his desk slashing harsh lines through names on a sheet of paper as excuses piled up. Some Masters joined after the timeline given, and the ones who had been replaced had been working on their own projects. Most Masters didn't have the financial capacity to support an independent experiment for months-going-on-years. He was left staring at just one name, the only man who commanded a Nidoking, Nidoqueen, Rhyperior, and Persian all at once. A man who came from what was rumored to be blood money. A man that he had been told by his predecessor he could trust with secrets and thoughts, a man tied into the core essence of the organization that Lance now led.

A man currently being possibly ousted from the one position in which Lance could have approached him without being suspicious.

Someone knocked on Lance's door. He quickly crumpled the sheet of paper, tossed it into a random drawer, and called for his visitor to enter. Blue swaggered in, all pride and thrill.

"I finally did it!" he crowed without prompting.

"You did what, exactly?"

Blue snorted, throwing himself into one of Lance's chairs. "C'mon Lance, stop acting dumb. I straight up flew through all of the trials that the League set before me and have proven myself to the powers that be." His nose wrinkled slightly. "Wish I didn't pass the last test on a technicality, but that's what happens when the old Master doesn't show up, I guess."

"Sorry, the old Master didn't show up?"

"Yeah, ol' Giovanni never made it in. Wonder what's up with the guy, seemed pretty out of character. Whatever, he cleared out his gym already for me before he disappeared, and it's Blue time now, baby! You're looking at Kanto's newest Ground Master! I can't wait to shove it into Green's face; she can't say anything about being superior to me now."

Lance's mind was so discombobulated that he didn't even think to tease Blue on his priorities. "Giovanni's gone?"

"Yeah," Blue shrugged. "Weird, isn't it? He's usually so meticulous about everything. Wonder where he went."

Lance thought of the balled-up list in his pocket and the boy down the hall. A lump formed in his throat and a pit in his stomach. "I do too," he choked out.

* * *

 **I know Gary's starter was technically a Squirtle, I just decided that was boring. For those curious: yes, I adapted some VGC rules to "match" rules. I enjoy watching the World Championships whenever it's time for them to roll around, and I try to keep up with the current meta as much as possible, so hopefully the clauses I've mentioned here make sense/still apply. Double battles aren't necessarily a thing here, though; no pesky built-in video game mechanics to demand that a move works the same way every time here. Also, there's a reference to 2014 VGC Masters World Champion Se Jun Park, mostly because I was trying to find a Masters World's team that didn't have a legendary and his was the most recent. Never forget Pachirisu.**


	8. Uprisings

**I got a very interesting review that asked basically why this entire story exists, citing that Lance should have taken other actions when he came across a terrified child and his Pokémon. I would have merely privately responded to this, but I realized it included a lot of meta/material I had written out and then discarded because I thought it bogged the first chapter down too much. Feel free to skip past the bolded section to get to the actual writing. If you want even more context as to why this story started, here you go:**

 **Besides the obvious "if Lance didn't react the way he did, we wouldn't have this story," Lance's main goal at the time was establishing trust between the terrified child (Ash) and himself (Lance). Could Lance have called in officers Jenny and requested that they find Ash a home? Absolutely. Why didn't he? Lance basically saw six creatures, one human but otherwise not acting very differently, and following his empathy more than his common sense, which told him to soothe them until they were calm enough to interact with. Agatha needles him about this in the same chapter (on purpose, actually; she's wily enough to know that the way to convince Lance to stick to his guns is by challenging his ability to do so. Crone's been around the block a few times). Lance emancipated a six-year-old because technically, legally, Ash can't own those Pokémon and Lance recognized that if he lost even one, Ash would completely shut down. The only way to defend one's right to a Pokémon in this universe is to have it registered under one's name, and while Lance could have captured Mewtwo etc. as he was by then planning to become Ash's legal guardian, he was still trying to, again, establish trust, which would not have held up to a "Now that you're here, I'm catching your friends" approach. Also, children don't usually appear at the League surrounded by overpowered Pokémon; Lance was trying to figure out who the kid was while also trying to balance making sure he was okay. If you couldn't tell, he wasn't that great at that balance and slowly prioritized training Ash over trying to figure out what happened to Ash. Lance is an imperfect man who is still trying to grow into himself despite decades of Pokémon experience.**

* * *

"Pardon me, Master Lance?" The League attendant alighted from his saddled Dodrio and walked over to where he stood. Lance spared a glance to look away from where Deino was relentlessly headbutting one of Gabite's legs while he kicked her away once in a while, sending her tumbling into the dust. Lance quickly gestured for the attendant to stop walking over with his companion Pokémon and whistled sharply; at the far side, Lance's Charizard paused just as he hoisted Haxorus into the air, about to throw him across the field. The winged lizard grumbled before slamming the Axe Jaw Pokémon on the ground in front of him instead.

"Alright, is there something you need?" Lance asked, keeping an eye on the brawling dragons in front of him.

The attendant whistled through his teeth. "I don't know how you control all of them so easily," he said under his breath. "A letter came in for you; it seemed too urgent to risk waiting for your return."

He nodded to him and called for Drakon, who was resting beside him, to slice the end of the envelope with an idle flick of a claw. Lance perused the note, all of three terse, scrawled sentences: _"L, it's Scott. Incident at Battle Pyramid. Come ASAP, bring team."_

Lance frowned. "Thanks for this, Seymour. I'll ask Frasier if his Alakazam can Teleport me directly there rather than fly over or respond." He turned back to the training field currently being ravaged by dragons. "Everyone! We're cutting training short today; I'm going to need you all in your Pokéballs and ready to go in one minute!"

The dragons all immediately dropped what they were doing to scurry over to Drakon, who was neatly arranging the team's Pokéballs in front of him. They growled at each other, pushing others out of the way, until Drakon barked out a snarl that cowed the other dragons into quietly waiting for their turn to return themselves.

Seymour snorted at the sight, shaking his head slightly. "Again. Couldn't ever do it." He gave Lance a nod before mounting his Dodrio once more and darting back to the League.

Lance turned back around to see Drakon and Wyvern left standing by the Pokéballs, snarling at each other. From what Lance could pick up, Wyvern was refusing to reenter her Pokéball while Drakon, confused and pride hurt, was trying to convince her to.

"Okay guys, no internal fighting," he chastised. "Wyvern, if you don't get in a Pokéball, I'm going to have to leave you here. You wouldn't be able to fight, if that's what ends up happening."

Wyvern, rather uncharacteristically, seemed content with that. Lance and Drakon exchanged a bewildered look before the human turned back to the more feral-looking Dragonite. "If that's your choice, please take your Pokéball and stay with Ash. I have reason to believe that he might be in danger in the near future. From now on, you're in charge of his safety."

The female Dragonite crooned toothily at that, snatched up her Pokéball, and began flying back to the League swiftly.

Lance sighed. "I was going to drop her off," he grumbled to Drakon, who smirked at his exasperation.

It didn't take too long to find Frasier and his Alakazam and ask for easy transport to Fuchsia City in order to track down the Battle Pyramid from there. Despite its general secrecy, it wasn't too much trouble for Lance to easily track it down. It was a bit hard to hide a giant metal structure from someone who knew its capacities.

Also, the spires of rock and ice and metal that peppered the ground outside of it were a bit of a giveaway.

Scott and Pyramid King Brandon were standing behind Scott's Beheeyem, who hovered in front of the two humans and had thrown up a Reflect shield. Scott had also released his Swampert and Brandon his Dusclops; the two Pokémon were standing just beyond the Reflect, hunched over in preparation for another round of battle. Scott had seemingly already connected with Swampert, as the water-ground-type loomed in his muscular Mega-state.

Standing before the defenders were colossuses of mineral. Lance had never seen one of the Legendary Titans, let alone all three at once, and he could see why the archaeologist within Brandon was so fascinated by them. There was something distinctly inhuman about how they stood, something mechanical about how they jerked their limbs and commanded their elements, and yet some element of a creator's touch that built the Titans with a deliberation and a touch of its own intelligence that was being turned against their current Trainer.

Regirock was a creature of rugged stone held together at its joints by clay that retained its structure while still dripping down its body. With every slow, staggered step forward that it managed to take, it sunk into the earth and rock clung to its form, amassing into smaller additional limbs that only served to propel it forward that small amount before crumbling away. Seven smooth stones were embedded in the lump that formed its makeshift head, and they flashed as the Pokémon took in more and more information about its surroundings. Every once in a while, all seven stones would flash and a sphere of condensed Electric energy shot out of the stone in the middle of its facial grid; Mega-Swampert would dive in front of Dusclops and absorb the energy, though he winced every time despite the Type-nullification that he supposedly had.

Regice seemed to have been carefully carved from five distinct pieces of clear, perfect ice, slotted together in a perfection that implied countless failures. Chilling air surrounded it, somehow both from its own aura and its own body, and though it seemed just as slow as Regirock, that seemed less from being so incredibly heavy and more from how it moved with such intention. Every single move that Regice made was calculated to be a perfect step forward, and it left behind a trail of frozen soil and air.

Registeel stood behind the other two Titans and wasn't moving forward at all. Its smooth body seemed oddly futuristic for a Pokémon thought to be built in the ancient past, and there was a craftiness that underlay its actions. The seven stones embedded in its head were arranged in a circle with one at its center, and they flashed in sequential order before all turning off and flashing once, a thin beam of light zooming out to explode the ground beneath where Mega-Swampert and Dusclops stood.

It was immediately obvious to Lance that the Titans were playing with the Pokémon in front of them, despite how exhausted they already seemed. Regirock, Regice, and Registeel were made to be indefatigable guardians of times past; few Pokémon could keep up with them, no matter how well-trained they were.

Lance quickly approached them, jumping off of Drakon and directing the Dragonite to run interference until he had fully figured out his plan.

"About time you showed up," Brandon grunted, pressing the return button on an Ultra Ball he held. The beam of light shot unerringly towards Regirock, who shot a thin beam of light towards Brandon's feet, forcing him to dash away before the earth exploded beneath him.

"What's going on?" Lance asked.

"Beats me," Scott said. "We were having our monthly meeting to ensure that the Battle Pyramid is in perfect condition when these three went berserk. We don't know what their goal is; they haven't made an attempt towards killing us or anything. We've managed to keep the damage contained to here, but who knows how long that'll last." He shouted a command over to Mega-Swampert; his beloved starter grunted and began summoning what appeared to be the beginning of a Hydro Cannon, but a quick beam attack from Registeel flashed forward and exploded it before he could launch it, covering him in water. The Mud Fish Pokémon snarled loudly in response before diving forward to block another Zap Cannon from hitting Dusclops.

Lance grabbed at his holster and quickly threw out about half of his team in front of him as well as a couple of members at his side; Drakon had already leapt into the fray, shooting out precise Hyper Beams that intercepted the attacks that Regirock flung out. Coatl joined him, though choosing to focus on Registeel instead, casting it in freezing cold to slow it down even further. Haxorus was gleefully diving towards Regirock, followed closely by Salamence, who had already coated her wings in a metallic sheen. Charizard glowed in a spiral of flame from Fire Spin as he flew directly into Regice, the move just enough to combat Regice's natural cold energy though not enough to affect the Titan specifically. Flygon chose to hover over the entire mess, raining attacks down from her position above the melee and twisting behind one of the claw-like spires erupting from the ground whenever one of the titans tried to hit her.

A tall, tree-like Pokémon stood next to Beheeyem. He bent his neck down, three heads blinking blankly before they all made eye contact with Beheeyem and Lance at the same time. Groaning, Lance's Exeggutor crooned strangely before whipping its neck around the three humans and setting up layers of Reflect, Light Screen, and Protect.

"It doesn't matter how many times I've seen him do that, it's still weird," Scott commented. Exeggutor narrowed all three pairs of his eyes at Scott.

Deino was also standing with Exeggutor and Beheeyem, watching the fight intently. Lance could see her head twitching back and forth as she tried to take in the entire battle from her place.

Despite the overwhelming number of Pokémon now bombarding the Titans, they didn't seem too bothered, simply choosing to eschew movement and focusing on bringing down all of their attackers. Regice had identified that most of its additional assailants could not withstand too many of its attacks and quickly went on the offensive. It very quickly summoned a freezing, subzero chill that it wrapped around the surrounding mass like a horrible blanket; further spires of ice clawed their way out of cracked earth from which Regice had summoned the moisture to form the misplaced stalagmites. Charizard snarled, blasting fire around it as much as it could to try and combat the dropping temperatures, but it made little difference and soon the Lizard Pokémon gave up and returned to barraging the indestructible Titan of Ice with the conserved flame.

Lance cursed that Wyvern, the Dragonite with the most training in commanding Fire, had remained at the League, though Coatl's training in Ice had helped him withstand the temperature drop better than most of his other team members. He could feel the chill despite both his coat and his cape; Brandon seemed equally affected while Scott somehow seemed completely undeterred by the sudden cold. Exeggutor notably shivered; after a few moments of trying to simply bear the freezing cold, the long-necked Pokémon finally caved and summoned a surprisingly weak orb of false sunlight that hovered above the men's heads, unable to coax the sun into shining brighter.

Registeel was mildly encumbered by the cold as well, but Regirock seemed completely fine, merely pulling more stone to arm itself and flinging its missiles towards Salamence. She growled and tried to twist away; unused to the cold, her muscles seized in the middle of her movement and the rock hit her with a glancing blow, throwing her off-balance. Haxorus paused to try and help her steady, only to be hit back by a rock himself. Mega-Swampert had finally succumbed to both injury and climate and was bent over on the ground, panting heavily as he tried to regain his energy.

"Flygon, Haxorus: set up a Comet focused on Regice! Break its concentration!" Lance shouted up. "Everyone else, try and keep the other two busy- don't let them interrupt!"

Flygon crowed in response; Haxorus merely grunted before darting forward, both claws glowing. He struck out quickly, slashing his arms downward to try and force Regice down. The Titan of Ice simply turned, stones flashing in a specific sequence before it shone with a purple light. A couple more series of flashes resulted in a beam of pure Ice energy rocketing towards Flygon. Haxorus quickly switched tactics and coated himself in pure raw energy before dashing forward to intercept the beam and crash into Regice. He howled as the searing cold drilled into him, only barely faltering as he tried to push through the remnants of the move and actually hit Regice. Lance felt his face contort in sympathetic pain; Haxorus had never taken a move so potent from such a powerful foe, and he dreaded the extent of the damage that his team member had taken.

Flygon had not wasted the time that Haxorus had bought for her; while still in the air, she flexed her seemingly frail wings and rolled into an intricate series of movements that prepared her to move as quickly as she could and build up the power she needed for the combination move. She briefly glowed a fiery blue; she whipped herself out, hovering for a moment while she focused on Regice before diving straight towards it, summoning draconic and fire energy around her right before she crashed down-

"Cover your ears!" Lance shouted at Scott and Brandon.

His warning was heeded not a moment too soon as Flygon's open mouth glowed with an incredibly light blue light and she let out a loud screech, a sound wave rippling through the air as she crashed on top of Regice. The other Dragons battling knew to throw up a Protect shield when they heard their Trainer call for the Comet; Exeggutor merely grunted before strengthening the Protect layer around himself.

Regice let out a high-pitched buzz that almost sounded strangled; Brandon somehow heard it around the ringing in his ears and quickly threw what looked like a blue Pokéball at Regice. The Titan was still stunned as a result from Flygon's attack and returned to the Pokéball with little fuss. Lance could see Flygon breathing heavily as she quickly stumbled back to her feet, taking off with a slight stumble. He whistled to call her back to him and returned her with a solemn thanks. Haxorus snarled when Lance offered the same rest to him, stubbornly forcing himself back to his feet and crouching to dive back into the fray.

"One down," Scott said, calling his Swampert back. "If Exeggutor is fine staying here, I could send Beheeyem in to help out. I've left the rest of my team at home, I'm afraid."

"Foolish of you to do that," Brandon grunted, returning his Dusclops and sending out a Ninjask that vanished with a burst of agility and a buzz from its wings.

"Normally, Swampert is enough to clean up anyone that tries to bother me. I don't usually find myself attacked by a Legendary, let alone three," Scott retorted.

Lance grunted. "It's your choice, Scott. I can take care of it if you want," he said.

Scott raised his hands in a farce of a surrender. "It's all yours, Mr. Champion."

Lance chose to ignore that. "Brandon, prepare to recall the remaining Regis." The Pyramid King nodded in acknowledgement.

The temperature was slowly returning to normal, though too slowly to have too much of an effect on the battle. The Titans had fully recovered and were returning to their turret-style of battle, shooting off beams that Lance's dragons were now choosing to dodge rather than redirect or take head-on as they had before. They were tiring, Lance noted, and he only had a couple of others to fall back on. He had hoped to save them for much later in battle.

"Drakon, Coatl, Charizard, I need you to override Registeel," he called out. His faithful Dragonites let out similar croons before turning their attention to the Titan at the back, Charizard doing so silently. "Everyone else, focus on Regirock until my next say so!"

While the Titan of Rock was kept busy, the three Pokémon that Lance had tasked with Registeel swept forward. Drakon and Coatl took turns sweeping forward to cut Registeel down while Charizard spat out bursts of flame, but it was stood firm, continually focusing in on its opponents and hitting them with what started out as inconsequential moves but gradually began to take their toll on the dragons.

"Haxorus, Earthquake! Everyone else, in the air!" Lance called.

The injured Haxorus grunted in acknowledgement, paused for his teammates to take flight, jumped up, and slammed into the ground, sending shockwaves through the ground. While it wasn't nearly as powerful as it would have been if he was at full health, the quake was enough to knock both Regirock and Registeel momentarily off balance, though they regained it rather quickly.

"Drakon, Coatl- set up a Thundersnow! Charizard, stay back until I say so!" Lance barked out. The two Dragonite summoned balls of their trained Type; Coatl unleashed his first, sending a focused Blizzard down on Registeel, followed immediately by a Thunder from Drakon that struck Registeel with a loud _BOOM!_

"Charizard, now! Fire Devil on Registeel!"

Charizard screamed in warning; the two Dragonite cleared out of the way. Charizard started by flying low, summoning dry, hot air behind him, and flying directly at Registeel, pulling up right as he was about to hit the Titan. Twisting out of the maneuver, Charizard sent torrents of energy directly on top of Registeel, flickering between flames and a purple, draconic fire. Registeel seemed to struggle to scramble out of the assault, but Charizard was able to dart around and redirect the flames that were now whirling in the air on their own thanks to a stabilizing Fire Spin.

Lance saw a spear of rock flying towards Charizard; Regirock had somehow managed to weave between the other dragons' assault and attack the one strongest against its ally. Drakon hurried over to send a quick burst of a Hyper Beam at it, but one relatively large chunk hit Charizard and send him barreling towards the ground. Lance quickly returned him. The Fire Devil was already starting to fall apart without its main source of control.

Brandon tried to take that as an opportunity to return Registeel, but the Pokémon had the wherewithal to interrupt the beam once more.

Lance noticed a strange glint in Drakon's eyes; before he could stop the Dragonite, Drakon had crooned something to Coatl and the two Dragonites were flying directly at Registeel. Lance could only blink in shock as Drakon and Coatl physically hoisted up the Steel-type Legendary and began to fly frantically into the air, their wings beating furiously to maintain height. Registeel was squealing wildly in response, flailing its arms to try and free itself as its stones flashed in an endless array of patterns. Lance saw his surprise reflected in both Haxorus and Salamence, who dutifully shot down the projectiles that Regirock was now throwing at the Dragonites to get them to unhand its ally.

"Do you think you have a good shot now?" Lance asked Brandon sardonically.

Brandon didn't bother responding, simply throwing an Ultra Ball at Registeel and returning it. The Dragonites stumbled slightly as their burden was unexpectedly taken from them before landing once more, chests heaving as they tried to recover from their improvised move.

"Can they do that with Regirock?" Scott asked.

"Probably not; they struggled a lot as it is, and Regirock is a bit heavier than Registeel," Brandon said. "I'd release one of these buggers to help us this time"- he gestured towards the Pokéballs containing Regice and Registeel- "if I was sure they wouldn't try and attack us."

"Yeah, probably hold off on that," Scott said.

Lance just smirked at them before unclipping his last few team members and releasing them. "Altaria, slow Regirock down. Gabite, help Haxorus out with whatever he has planned. Kingdra and Gyarados, freeze Regirock in place and rain down on it!"

Haxorus gave a growl as he stepped back to allow Gabite to appear in front of him. Gyarados immediately rippled into the air, undulating as she circled the Rock Titan, while Kingdra stayed close to the ground, hovering over a patch of Regice's melting ice. Altaria had chosen to take flight and circle over Regirock, letting out clouds of downy feathers that clogged its clay joints and forced it into a standstill. Within seconds, Gyarados and Kingdra had blasted Regirock with enough Hydro Pumps to fully distract it from Brandon throwing a Pokéball made to look as though it were carved out of a stone at it and turning it back into bright red light.

Scott looked at his watch. "Four minutes, thirty-seven seconds. Impressive."

"Thanks," Lance said. "Now, can one of you please enlighten me as to what the hell that was?"

"Your guess is as good as mine, Dragon Master," Brandon said. "They punched a hole in the side of the Pyramid and were about to make a run for it when Swampert and Dusclops caught up to them and engaged them long enough for Scott to call the League to send for you and keep them entertained until you arrived. I'm not sure why he decided only to call you over, personally."

"Well, if there's any one man that could take all three Titans on, it would be our indomitable Champion, no?" Scott asked. "I was a bit more concerned about making sure Fuchsia City remained intact than I was about calling in as much backup as necessary. Those dragons are a full army, Lance; they're terrifying to behold."

"Terrifying? You should see Agatha's ghosts," Lance muttered. "Were they the only Pokémon affected?"

"It seems that way," Scott said. "Beheeyem was out as she insists on being always, and she didn't go mad as you saw. I assume Dusclops was already out of his Pokéball as well, seeing as he was the one chasing the Regis down when we first saw them running rampant."

Lance furrowed his brow. "I'll make a note of this and ask the other Champions if anything similar has happened in their regions," he said. "If I have any questions, I'll reach out, but otherwise I don't have an immediate solution."

Brandon and Scott nodded solemnly. Lance recalled the majority of his team members before asking Salamence to bring him back to the League.

* * *

"Lance! Lance!"

Something was wrong. Lance pushed away the twinge of resignation as he put down some set-up paperwork for the Indigo Tournament and quickly stood up from his desk. He barely got up when Ash banged through his doors, Egg barely clinging to his shoulder.

"Ash? What's wrong?" he asked.

"It's Program! He's disappeared! I can't find him anywhere!" His voice cracked and suddenly Lance's arms were filled with a boy on the edge of tears. Egg let out a sad croon, jumping onto Lance's head.

"Is there anywhere he would have gone? You just downloaded one of Duplica's upgrades, right? He can't have gone too far," Lance said.

Ash let out a small whimper but didn't respond.

"Alright, let's go to your rooms and see what exactly happened," Lance said. Ash just nodded before detaching himself from the man and walking beside him.

The room was in the most disarray that Lance had ever seen it. Blankets were thrown to the floor, the mattress of the bed hovering in the air as Mewtwo systematically took the bed frame apart piece by piece to closely examine every section. Amber was dashing back and forth across the room, seemingly incapable of doing anything besides checking under tables, chairs, and counters. Fossil was scuttling in a circle, waving his legs around whenever he paused to look around. Bulbasaur was calling out as he jogged through the rooms, his growls sounding panicked.

Mewtwo whipped his head around upon hearing the door open and visibly sagged in relief when he saw Lance. _'Master-Drake, our companion- companion-friend-brother- has gone missing- nowhere-nowhere-can't find.'_ Lance had never heard Mewtwo babble before, but the psychic kept losing control of the precise words that he had been trained to use and reverting back to the headache-inducing stream of consciousness speech he used when Lance first met him. _'Gone-gone-where- where would he go? Is there anywhere nearby that he could have disappeared- vanish!-panic-worry- gone off to? Why would it induce him to go there without a warning- unknown-fear-where?!'_

"I'm sorry, I can't think of anywhere off the top of my head," Lance said, striding into the room to look around for some clue of where Program might be. "We have a hardware room, but if Program was attracted to it he would have let on sooner. Nothing new has been installed or anything of that ilk. Can you give me a list of where you've already checked?"

Mewtwo closed his eyes, the bed slowly coming back together and the mattress slowly replacing itself as he concentrated. _'Bed, table, chair, water-room, capsule, bag,'_ Mewtwo recited. _'He would have made himself known if he were in any electronic device, wouldn't he?'_

"If he's incapacitated, he might not be able to. Where's Ash's Pokédex?" The Pokédex wriggled itself out from under the mattress that Mewtwo had just lain down and Mewtwo floated the red device over to him.

When Lance opened the device, he didn't expect the first thing he saw to be a line of blinking red text on the top of the screen. He stared at it uncomprehendingly for a second before hurriedly dismissing himself and leaving the room.

Lance burst back into his office and immediately turned on a computer that connected to a large screen opposite to his desk. A calm voice greeted him and asked him what he needed.

"Connect me to Duplica. This is urgent," he said tersely.

 _'Certainly. Calling: Normal Master Duplica Carlysle.'_ A quiet song signaling that the call was connecting started playing. Lance tapped his fingers on his desk, unable to sit still for too long.

Lance thanked whatever Legendary was watching over him that Duplica was a prompt responder. She was wearing her Gym Leader outfit: a white tunic, black pants, and a shiny lilac cloak held together by a black string tied around two small black buttons. _"Hey, Lance! Can't chat for too long; I've got a challenger in about half an hour. Did you need something?"_

"Yes, hello, hi, you sent me some code for a programmed Pokémon, correct?"

Duplica cocked her head, confused. _"Yep. It worked like a charm for .EXE- power boost, even a more streamlined look- so I would think it would work for almost any other Pokémon of that nature. Is something up?"_

Lance clicked Ash's Pokédex open. "Well, the Projector that we've got installed in this Pokédex is reading a syntax error. The Pokémon itself has disappeared somewhere. Is there anything you can do about that?"

 _"A syntax error?! Hold on Lance, one second- Jeremy. Jeremy! Reschedule my match for today and mark me as unavailable. If the challenger gives you a tough time over it, sic Kangaskhan on his ass. Lance, I'm coming through to your office in five!"_ She reached over and disconnected the call without further fanfare. As promised, Duplica appeared in Lance's office, the Abra beside her quickly shrinking back into the blob that was Mini-Dit.

"Can I see that 'dex?" Duplica asked, holding her hand out. "Also, can I get access to your computer?"

"Yes and yes," Lance said, handing the Pokédex to him while backing away from the main control center of the computer.

Duplica quickly plugged the Pokédex into his system and pulled up a basic programming application- "Really, Lance, you've got to download Seviper at the very _least_ ,"- and connected to the files within the Projector on the Pokédex. She took a minute to scroll through the lines of code.

"First of all, this code is archaic at best. A Mankey with a keyboard would have better luck at writing something up with this. This is most likely not just a syntax error but a complete misreading of a line somewhere in this spaghetti that isn't worth the shit that comes out of a Rattata's ass," Duplica said. Lance raised an eyebrow at the unexpected language. She looked at him sheepishly. "Sorry. When it's my code causing a problem when it shouldn't, I get upset."

"Understandable," Lance said. "What does that mean for the Pokémon stored here?"

Duplica bit her lip. "I'm not sure, which is the worst answer, I know. I can shore this code up, make it perfect and polished, but programmed Pokémon are extremely tricky. It'd be a combination of trying to make sure that its sentience is somehow unaltered but its body is made stronger. Whoever wrote this somehow toddled into making a sentience- nothing here says that this should be a conscious Pokémon. If I touch it, I might accidentally erase the section that gives it life, or worse, give it two consciousnesses. Not too pretty if you do that; there are quite a few papers on the consequences."

"Is there anything you can do?"

"I can try to readapt the code I wrote up to match this," she said. "I'm not too hopeful on that, but I can try. There's no way to guarantee that it'll work, though." Duplica leaned back, rubbing her eyes. "Honestly? I'm shocked that this programming survived as long as it did. There are at least eight fatal glitches in the section I've glanced through alone. It should have expired a long time ago. I can give it a crack tonight but I'd honestly say that it's most likely a lost cause. Best bet is to take the bits and pieces of this Pokémon to hold onto and try to recreate the consciousness rather than fix this one, y'know what I mean?"

Lance sighed. "Alright. I can't give you this Pokédex to take back, but perhaps you can take a copy of the code with you and mess around with it in your own time?"

"Sounds good to me. Really sorry about how that turned out, Lance," she said.

"I'm sorry for making you delay a challenger just for this to be useless," Lance responded.

Duplica shrugged. "If they want a challenge they can wait. If they want the badge, they can attempt to overwhelm Kangaskhan and most likely go back to the Pokémon Center and wait." She poked Mini-Dit on the top of its head, prompting it to Transform into an Abra once more. "Let me know if you need anything," she said, vanishing back to the House of Imite.

Lance stood, staring where she was standing, trying to figure out what to do about the situation, when he heard the sounds of light footsteps running away. He closed his eyes, realizing that Ash had overheard enough of what had happened to understand what was going on. He steeled himself to go down to Ash's room and knock on the door.

It creaked open, just as it usually did, and he carefully walked in. Ash was curled up, holding Fossil to his chest as tears streamed down his face. He was lying on the bed, Egg curled next to him and Amber sitting beside him. Bulbasaur was at the foot of the bed, staring up helplessly. Mewtwo floated nearby.

Lance and Mewtwo looked at each other, Mewtwo probing and Lance allowing it to happen.

 _'He cannot be found,'_ Mewtwo said dully.

"Duplica beat herself up over it, but yes. It's beyond even her capabilities to guarantee that he can be brought back," Lance said.

Ash made no indication that he heard anything.

 _'Is there still hope?'_ Mewtwo asked.

Lance took a moment to think the question through. "I would say so, yes," Lance said. "It is very slim, yes, but I admit, I like to think on the positive side of things."

Mewtwo didn't respond, but he did nod to Lance. The Dragon Master took that as the dismissal that it was and chose to leave the room.

Ash was inconsolable for a week or so, refusing to leave his room for lessons with Lorelei and Lance. Duplica had contacted Lance every day, her updates reflecting that she hadn't figured the code out quite yet, but that she intended to. Lorelei didn't seem to know exactly what was happening with the group but didn't push it when Lance asked her to give Ash some space. Lance had the feeling that he wouldn't be welcome to Ash's room until he was able to bring them a restored Program, so he sent Wyvern to watch over Ash in his place. She seemed more than happy with the task, staying with the young boy for hours every day and slinking back to Lance late at night, when he inevitably went to sleep. Wyvern had always been his most aloof Dragonite, secretive despite being one of his closest partners; perhaps he should have paid slightly more attention to the gleams in her eye and how her gaze rested on him for a second too long.

One day, Ash, Mewtwo, and the Pokémon they arrived with vanished from their room. Bulbasaur had woken up to find them gone and frantically ran to Lance's office nearly in tears to babble for help. When he tried to ask her, Wyvern turned away from Lance, refusing to answer any of his questions.

Sabrina wasn't too forgiving when she arrived to the League to tutor Mewtwo in some new skill the next day.

"He's gone? Completely? All of them?"

Lance glanced down to the despondent Bulbasaur that had taken to tailing him everywhere, desperate to not be abandoned once more in his life. He bent over to pick the Pokémon up, carefully supporting his weight as the Seed Pokémon buried his head in the crook of his arm.

"Most of them," Lance said.

Sabrina's eyes narrowed as they followed his movements; she herself stayed stock still. "Forgive me if I don't quite understand why," she said.

"Forgive me, Sabrina, for not quite understanding either," he shot back. "Wyvern refuses to tell me and no one else still here even knew that it was a plan. Not even Bulbasaur, who'd been more than accepted into that party before this happened."

"Wyvern knew?"

"She must have. She's too smart not to have figured it out."

Lance watched as Sabrina took a deep breath, pulled out a chair, and settled herself into it. "Well then," she said after a lengthy pause. "I don't know what to do with this information," she admitted.

"Neither do I," Lance said, walking over to his desk and sitting at his own chair. Bulbasaur curled up further in his lap, uncharacteristically silent during this exchange. "I take it Duplica told you what happened."

Sabrina nodded silently.

"It would be an understatement to say that they took it hard," Lance said.

"I can imagine so," Sabrina said. "Are you searching for them?"

Lance sighed and leaned back. "I'd love to, but you've taught Mewtwo far too well and you know how Ash is. If they don't want to be found, I have the feeling they won't be found."

"You never know," Sabrina said, though she seemed as resigned as Lance was.

Lance rubbed his eyes with a hand. "Anyhow, I'm sorry for not contacting you when it happened to cancel any appointment you had with them. I'll do my best to keep you updated on whatever happens."

Sabrina hesitated before standing up. "Master Lance, if there's anything I could do, please tell me. Despite how much of a brat he was, I do care for the child in my own way," she said rather stiffly.

Lance nodded to her, watching silently as she Teleported back home.

* * *

"Thank you all for coming here on such short notice," Lance said, glancing around the table. He and his guests were seated in a slightly more upscale room kept in the League for such formal occasions.

"Of course, Master Lance," one of his guests responded. The man looked to a watch on his wrist, each movement precise in its placement. "That being said, we should get on quickly with what it is we are discussing. Our own Masters want to discuss exactly our topic here today."

"Yes, yes, Steven, we know, you're always ready to leave the moment you arrive, and have been for the past year," a man with bushy auburn hair responded, sipping from a mug that one of the League attendants had offered him. "This is an excellent blend, Lance; where did you get it from?"

"We aren't here to discuss teas, Alder," a rather refined-looking woman in a white pantsuit said, her voice lilting in a somewhat musical accent. "This is a matter of international importance, and it would be uncouth for us to get too distracted." She looked back to Lance. "Please, Lance, continue."

"Thank you, Diantha. Now, I'm sure we've all noticed some strange outbreaks of Pokémon behavior or ecological imbalance throughout our regions."

"Nothing too big yet in Sinnoh," a young blonde woman sitting beside Diantha stated. "Roark reported some strange activity within Mount Coronet; some of the wild Pokémon were blocking off generally well-trodden paths. He had to go in with a few of his team members to negotiate leaving the main footpath through the mountain open. Some shipments to Canalave City have been greatly delayed in their arrival as well, and Snowpoint City has been reporting some of the most intense blizzards in recent history."

"Hoenn is similar," Steven said. "Some of the routes around Fortree have reported harsher rains, though as it is the rainy season we can't attest if that's natural or not. Some of the monks who work to guard the Cave of Origin have been reporting splitting headaches, and there's more sightings of Mirage Island, though it seems with the influx of rumor more Trainers have been seeking it out."

Lance's other guests couldn't think of anything too out of the ordinary to report, and Lance noticed one who he hadn't expected to agree to arriving.

"Professor Kukui, thank you for coming out here despite your region not quite being associated with the League yet; I understand that Alola is close to its native Legendary Pokémon and was curious to see if yours have been affected."

Professor Kukui nodded, fidgeting with the silver band on his left ring finger as the gazes of some of the most powerful Trainers in the League system turned to him. "Ah, yes, well," he said, "our islands are pretty connected to the Tapus, and I haven't heard anything yet of a disaster on any scale. They've been a bit quieter than the norm, if anything."

"Fascinating, to live among the creatures we fear," Cynthia proclaimed. "I'd love to see exactly how much your bond with those Legendaries affects the surges that we've been observing, as well as the connection of the Legendaries to the surges at all."

"Now's not the time for that kind of observation, Cynthia," Steven said. "Now's the time for action and for decisions. We cannot spend another month of observation in Hoenn. If our suspicions are correct, the very earth and ocean could override us if we wait too long."

Cynthia's grey eyes, once with a dreamy expression as she fantasized about the research opportunities, immediately went steely and honed in on Steven. "You may think yourself the elder between the two of us based on your age alone, but don't forget that I've been in my position for far longer than you and have spent even more time memorizing the histories of my home region," she said. "The ocean could rise in your homeland, but space and time itself could be rent in mine. Spear Pillar is said to have been the one place in the whole world that Arceus itself touched down to mortal land. My people would be torn down where they stand."

"Can we stop being so woebegone for a moment? Oh, to be young again and bothered by such things as pride," an older man, bald but with white eyebrows that trailed like Gyarados's whiskers, said, leaning back in his chair. "This tea is quite nice, Lance, Alder was correct in that. Galar cannot boast such terrifying mythos as the world itself splitting within our boundaries, but our heroes of legend possess an interminable amount of power themselves. I, for one, would not want my citizens to come across an angry Dubwool, much less any creature with the capacity to cease wars, as it is told to our children."

"We need a plan," Steven repeated, though slightly more bashfully now after hearing Cynthia snap at him.

"We will get to a plan," Lance said, already growing tired of the egos he had to balance in the room. His own inner Dragon was roiling to escape and to whip all of the other Champions in place, but he managed to swallow it back in favor of shouldering through this meeting. "You all have recounted incidents of hordes of Pokémon uprising. I have had the pleasure of having to wrangle three Legendaries to prevent them from destroying a major city in Kanto."

That caught all of the other Champions' attentions. "What city was close enough to the dwelling of three Legendaries?!" Cynthia asked disbelievingly.

"At the moment, Fuchsia City. I'm relatively good friends with Scott, the man who manages the Battle Frontier."

"He is such a strange man," Diantha mused. "Truly a spectacular spectacle-holder."

"He's nice enough," Cynthia defended. "We've opened up a Battle Frontier in Sinnoh, and it's relatively successful from what I can tell."

"One of the Frontier Brains of the Kanto Frontier is a man who goes by Pyramid King Brandon. Part of the challenge of the Battle Frontier, at least in this region, is that the challenger must find and defeat each Battle Facility in a specific order, and they are told where the next destination in their journey is upon completing one step. The final Facility is a place known as the Battle Pyramid, run by Brandon, and it's known for being the only Facility that isn't stationary. Don't ask me how Brandon hides a flying Pyramid. I can only speculate that he has a powerful Psychic Pokémon. Brandon is also known for his archaeological work." Lance turned to Cynthia. "You may know him as Brandon Norgay."

Cynthia raised her eyebrows. "He's well-known in the academic community for his practical research into ruins, yes," she said.

"He's also notorious within the elite circle in Kanto for his single-minded pursuit of the Legendary Titans. Last year, he managed to finally unite three of them found within this region."

"And you let him?!" Steven asked, fixing Lance with a bewildered look. Hoenn had been the ones to first uncover the Titans; he must have been educated on just how destructive they could be in the wrong hands.

"It was more of a case of 'if Brandon can do it with the right research, then who else could?' than his commanding the Titans was a concern to us. It was safer for him to learn all that he could about them while training them, and then we had a guarantee that nothing nefarious was being done with them. It felt like the best solution," Lance said. "Scott didn't complain too much; he just gave Brandon more funding to galvanize the Pyramid for battles. I don't meddle with the Frontier's inner workings. Scott has his own somewhat terrifying reputation, and I'd like to avoid poking him, personally."

"Why did you bring up Brandon, Lance?" Cynthia asked.

"He and Scott were having a scheduled meeting that was rudely interrupted by rampaging Legendary Pokémon," Lance said drily. "Long story short, they contacted me quickly and held their ground until I could come in and take them down. While I would like to dismiss the whole event as a fluke, we could have a potentially huge disaster on our hands if more Legendary Pokémon suddenly lose their minds."

"What would you have us do?" Alder asked. "The Legends have always been unpredictable at best. For them to sporadically turn on whatever and whoever is around- that could destroy the world, no matter how large a figure they are in our respective mythologies. I, for one, would not want Reshiram and Zekrom restored to tear Unova apart again, and from what you imply, only those deemed Masters have the raw power capable of even attempting to hold the Legends back. I assume you were not aiming to incapacitate the Titans but to distract them so their proper Trainer could recall them."

Lance nodded stiffly. "It took almost my entire team's strength to simply tire the Titans until Brandon could wrest control back from them. As much as I trust my Pokémon, I can't actually guarantee that they could have beaten more than Registeel; Regice would have been practically insurmountable if they were fighting capture. The Titans never went above a manageable power level; the idea of a wild Legend using all of its power to escape capture is honestly terrifying to me. Even idly, the Titans twisted their environment; spires of metal and ice and stone were erupting from the ground when I arrived, and only because I distracted them did no others form."

"You're making this sound like a hopeless situation, Lance," Diantha stated. "The Titans are known for being lesser Legendaries as synthetic Pokémon that were at one point fully understood. The Legendary Pokémon as a whole are fragments of the powers that govern our world. Land and Sea and Sky themselves breathed within Steven's home region, and Life and Death once ran and flew through mine. The idea that these Pokémon will stop being mere story and become world-altering forces once more- it's, frankly, frightening to consider."

"Our regional Masters may be the only thing that can truly be depended on to defend our regions, and that leads to my proposition." Lance commanded everyone's attention now. "I propose we create an interregional group specifically designed to look into any suspected Legendary-affiliated disasters. I'll talk to Charles Goodshow to see if we can put it under League purview and avoid having to deal with some of the politics ourselves so we can focus on keeping our constituents safe. I'm sure that my Fire Master, Blaine Nigma, would be more than willing to work on exclusive communicators that we could use between us- Steven, perhaps your father would be willing to help out as well?" The Hoenn champion pondered that for a second before nodding slowly.

"My Electric Master, Clemont, could also be trusted with this," Diantha said. "He may be rather young, but he is known in our region for his ingenuity when it comes to inventions. I'm sure he would be more than willing to make this project his top priority, especially if it came as a direct order from me."

Lance mentally frowned at her dismissive treatment of one of her Masters but nodded. "We can begin to amass a team from those we trust for this," Lance said. "Kanto and Johto are both now governed by Masters I trust, which reminds me- a corrupt man just left his seat of power within Kanto and should not be trusted in any region. If Giovanni diLaon attempts to enter your region, know that he is nothing now and should be brought down via any means necessary."

Cynthia's eyes narrowed as she studied Lance, her gaze surgically working away at his words. "Any means, Lance? That hasn't been called for in a long time."

"He has been the principle force driving an abominable scientific act, among other things," Lance said. "The breadth of his crimes are still being uncovered. I want him brought down. I don't care how it happens."

"Bold words, Dragon Master," Mustard murmured. "Such fire. Such pride." He chuckled out a dry cough. "Ah, to be young again."

"Let's return to what we came here to discuss," Steven said. "I will talk to my father about at the very least funding the invention of an exclusive communicative device. He will most likely ask to hold onto any blueprints so that our engineers could use some components for a more commercially available product to sell. That's just how Devon Corporation works when it comes to outside collaborations. With that funding, we would have a team headed by Master Blaine and Master Clemont. We use their invention to stay in contact and keep an eye on anything we deem as a 'Legendary disaster,' as Lance put it. We may have to publically state that we are looking into criminal activity so that the public does not panic over the concept of their world being torn apart and reborn by rampant Legendary Pokémon."

"A long-winded summary, but yes," Cynthia said.

"A member of a government-sponsored organization, after Goodshow gets his hands on it." Alder shook his head in wonder. "Never thought it would happen to me. Zekrom's bolt."

"I, for one, am looking forward to becoming a G-Man, even just unofficially," Kukui declared. "It's an exciting endeavor, don't you think?"

"I'm sure it will be," Cynthia said, leaning back into her chair. "G-Man. Has a nice ring to it, even if it sounds a bit exclusionary. Good going, Professor."

"I feel silly calling myself such a thing," Steven said. "It almost feels like a childhood game."

"Well, we need to call it something," Lance said with a sigh. "Alright. I'll start the process of getting the G-Men approved. Steven, I'll get you Blaine's contact information if your father agrees to sponsor this invention of ours. Otherwise, feel free to send me a missive." The other regional representatives readily agreed to this before departing.

* * *

Sabrina had taken to visiting the League when she had previously scheduled lessons with Mewtwo. "I did not realize how relaxing it felt to close the gym and leaving the city," she admitted. "I love Saffron and would lay down my life for its people, but it can be loud and dissonant. My head can't cope with it all of the time."

Lance watched her almost lazily flick a finger to stir a spoonful of sugar into her tea. "I can understand that," Lance said. "Blackthorn was a quieter city than most, and Saffron is overwhelming for the most robust travelers."

"That is perhaps the quintessential definition of an understatement," Sabrina said, leaning back as she hovered her teacup over to herself.

Lance sighed, stretching his neck slightly. "I've been trying to dig up anything on Giovanni's past for days," he said. "It's all been heavily encrypted, even within the League system. Duplica hasn't made a dent in it, and she's one of the most skilled programmers we have."

Sabrina looked at him sharply. "What would you want to know about him?" she asked.

"Anything that would give me more information," he muttered. "Mewtwo and Ash haven't spoken extensively about their life previous to being here, and-" Lance stopped himself for a second, remembering belatedly that Sabrina didn't have all of the information he did. "It's a more tragic story than I want to get into," he said finally. "I believe Giovanni is tied to its more sinister elements. It has taken his disappearance for me to realize that I barely know anything about the man."

Sabrina's eyes had gone emotionless, and she was staring into her teacup now. Her Alakazam had opted to meditate beside her, and he was casting concerned glances to his Trainer as she sat stock-still.

"I haven't properly talked to Giovanni in years," she said with a voice barely above a whisper, "but he approached me once."

Lance looked at her sharply. "I'm sorry?"

"It was almost five years ago now," she said, still not looking up. "I had just met you. I don't know how he learned about me. I was still struggling with the extent that my powers were expanding, I was young, and I was afraid. He approached me, introduced himself as the Ground Master, and said that he wanted to help me. He claimed to have pharmacologists, psychologists, neurologists, dozens of people that could help me truly understand what was happening to me. Of course, in exchange, I would work for him. I was just reaching thirteen; I wasn't capable of paying him or somehow earning the money for such treatments otherwise.

"I didn't decline immediately, though I wish I did," Sabrina said almost bitterly. "I held onto it for long enough that Giovanni invited me to a facility he ran on the outskirts of Viridian City. It seemed like just an office building connected to a laboratory; he claimed that his group was just starting but that I would receive top-of-the-line care. I was walked through the hallways and introduced to some of the administrators; apparently, Giovanni had asked them to come in to meet me. There were only two when I was there, a man and a woman. They were kind enough, but it felt like they were studying me rather than trying to persuade me to work for them. In the end, you and my father devised a solution I preferred and so I declined Giovanni's offer. I haven't truly spoken to him since."

"He was recruiting from the Masters?" Lance asked.

"I wasn't quite a Master yet," Sabrina said. "It was a few months before I challenged Father and won the title from him. That might be partially why I didn't immediately recall this incident. I became very quickly consumed in Mastership; Giovanni's strange job offer wasn't important in the grand scheme of things."

Lance bit the inside of his cheek, remembering strange stuttered words that a boy had told him years ago. "Do you remember the man or woman's name?" he asked.

Sabrina sat, deep in thought. "I believe the man called himself Archer and the woman Ariana," she said. "Ariana acted strangely close to Giovanni; she seemed to treat me more like his pet. Archer was a more focused individual who didn't see me as important enough to speak with."

"Ariana, did you say?" Lance asked. "This may be a strange question- can you describe her hair more thoroughly for me?"

"That is, in fact, a very strange request, Dragon Master," Sabrina said, deadpan. "You ought to be grateful that I have an eidetic memory. It was a vibrant red, close to the color of a ripe cheri berry. Rather crimson more than vermillion. Judging by the state of her roots, however, it was completely natural. Same with Archer's lighter blue hair, which I would have thought a completely unnatural color."

"Lola's got purple hair," Lance pointed out.

"Lola is no human. She is a demon sent from another plane to haunt me," Sabrina muttered.

"She sent her Beedrill to buzz in your vent only one time," Lance said.

"That was one time too many."

"Point taken. As useless as that information seemed, it's definitely very useful to me." Lance sighed. "I guess I have to try and research that facility you mentioned.

"One more thing for you to look for, Lance; Giovanni did say that it was still a working title rather than an official name, but he called his company Rocket Corporations when he tried to recruit me," Sabrina said. "Perhaps that will be a useful tidbit to you."

* * *

A few weeks after meeting with the other Champions, Lance was suddenly overrun by reports of bizarre instances around Cerulean City. Daisy had called him, saying that sections of her city were being plunged into blackouts while others reported fuses blowing and the electrical grids for many houses exploding. She found herself handing the Gym Leader mantle to two of her sisters and patrolling the city's streets, trying to keep any sudden fires under control.

"I'm, like, mostly worried about this massive thunderstorm that just rolled in from the south, Lance," she said. "It looks disgusting! So many houses could be hit by lightning, and I can't be everywhere at once. Do you know what's going on?"

"No clue," Lance said grimly. "I'm stuck in the middle of negotiations over the Indigo League Tournament or I'd be out there, too. Try calling in William Montgomery, maybe? He might be able to provide some assistance. If you just need people on the ground, Pokémon Tech might have some seniors you could call upon quickly, or you can see if Nolan from the Battle Factory is busy."

"Alright, sounds good. I'll try and send a few calls out," Daisy said. "I'm, like, going to have to go. This is so stressful! I can't believe how unprepared I, like, feel!" Lance could hear her releasing a Pokémon and start running down the street. "I'm going to hang up; I'm really worried about the Pokémon Center."

"Wait, actually, Daisy, before you hang up, as soon as you get to the Center, call Blue and ask him to transfer his Marowak to you," Lance said. "I believe he's got one that has Lightning Rod; it won't be able to redirect everything, but it should help."

"Amazing! Good! I think Brock's King has Lightning Rod too- I'll try and get them both to either come or lend me their team members." Lance heard a loud crash through the phone. "Oh shit, oh fuck! I need to call other people in; I'll call you back with a better report! Vaporeon, Hydr-" The line went dead.

Lance felt his jaw set as he put his Pokégear away. He felt utterly powerless, not being able to call together all of his Masters sooner to tell them about the G-Men or help Daisy in Cerulean. No matter how much was added onto his plate, Lance had to keep himself at the League to facilitate communications; he had left often enough in the past few weeks that he at least could give them that. Lance sighed before turning back to his computer, glancing over the draft of the email he had yet to send to Blaine, and fixing a couple of typos before sending it off. Wyvern and Deino were curled up in a mound of dragon off to his side, Bulbasaur buried somewhere beneath them; Lance looked at them for a long while before folding his arms on his desk and leaning his head down, giving himself a moment to re-center and calm down.

He heard a chorus of confused growls mere seconds before he heard feet on the floor; Lance looked up, having not heard anyone open the door.

A dripping wet Ash stood in front of him, Pokéballs on his belt holster, Egg balanced on his shoulders, Mewtwo floating somewhat behind him. He was wearing the clothes that Lance had shown him to explain how to analyze the quality of travelling gear; water dripped from his shirt. The boy looked like a drowned rat and hadn't moved a muscle since appearing, but behind his shivers, there was a spark of energetic fire in his eyes.

Lance blinked a couple of times before releasing Altaria and sending the Humming Pokémon off to find a large towel. Altaria obliged, returning swiftly to dump the wet cotton on Ash's head, snapping him out of his trance. Egg zoomed off of him, shaking the water in his fur out.

Ash's stride barely broke as the towel landed on him; he was already moving around Lance's desk and throwing himself into Lance's arms. Lance embraced the wayward child, feeling him shudder beneath the thick layer of cloth.

 _'Master-Drake?'_ Lance looked over to Mewtwo. He looked abashed, guilty. _'We apologize for our... disappearance. In a moment of folly, we thought perhaps that it wasn't as safe here as we thought it was. We were traveling east of here to find a new home when we came across a large electrical facility in the middle of a storm. When we went in, we were nearly beaten down by overpowered residents.'_ Mewtwo's gaze dropped. _'We thought ourselves powerful enough for the world. We were wrong. Please, don't make us leave, this is all we had. We were fools to not acknowledge that sooner.'_

"Of course you can stay, Mewtwo," Lance said. "It was as much my fault as it was yours; I should have been more transparent so that we could all work together on feeling safer. The world has gotten more dangerous even in the weeks you were gone."

Mewtwo nodded. _'The world itself breathes now,'_ he said. _'I feel it within me, the power influx. The world is crying out for me to reshape it, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. Fire-Drake-Lance, it scares me. It is intoxicating, and I do not trust myself with it. It wants to shape me into a tool, but I am more than that, aren't I?'_

"You are," Lance said. "We can work through this with the proper training." His mind caught up to what Mewtwo said. "Also, if you could explain to me what you mean by the world crying out for you, I could find more answers for us both."

 _'It's... painful,'_ Mewtwo said. _'Even now I hear it. I can feel it here'_ \- tapping in the center of his chest- _'and it feels excruciating to ignore. It feels as though the world's energy is straining within me. If I were to relent and allow it to do what it wanted, I would have the power and will to shape the earth itself into whatever I wanted it to be.'_

"What _do_ you want it to be, Mewtwo?" Lance asked. "What would you do with that power?"

 _'I want to keep Ash safe,'_ Mewtwo said, _'and I want to be greater than my origin. I would want to conquer Mew and claim my superiority to the entire world.'_

* * *

"Before you left, Ash, you were very interested in combination attacks."

That perked the boy up from the uncertainty he had been wearing. Mewtwo was hovering closer to the door, merely observing the two humans interact. Egg sat on Ash's shoulder, as was usual.

"From what I recall, your instinct is already to lean towards linking moves together, at the very least," Lance said. "Your mind doesn't just think of the move you're making, but the move that should follow and the next strategic point you're trying to reach. That's an important part of discerning a combination move: you have to know what you want the move to accomplish.

"Do you remember the combination moves that Brock asked me to polish last year?"

Ash nodded.

"The few combination moves that he showed in that display had specific purposes. Aida used Stone Spires, which was meant not only to be an offensive move but also to be both a disorienting tactic and a way to control the environment. Onix's Pleiochroia, as he stated then, is an offensive move disguised as a defense. Brock has had quite a few more years of experience than you have, so I don't expect you to think of every possible use, but having a purpose in mind is important in building a move well."

Now Ash seemed confused.

"I'm not going to make you come up with a combination move right now," Lance said. "That would be foolish. I spend hours researching every way that my team members have used various basic techniques in the past, as well as their general behavior in order to come up with a combination move that I'd like to pull off." Lance took out a small, very worn out notebook from one of his coat pockets. "I've carried this with me since the day I started out on my own journey away from home. I've taken notes on all of my team members, from diet to when they evolved. It's one of my prized possessions. I also draft all of my possible combination moves in here."

Ash stared at the notebook with wide eyes; Egg let out an appreciative chirp. "Why haven't I seen it before?" Ash asked.

Lance opened the notebook; despite having written in it for just over two decades, he was only two-thirds of the way through the thick book. "I keep it in my pocket at all times. The idea of anyone else even knowing of this book's existence is a bit frightening to me, to be honest." He turned to his most recent entry and gestured Ash over. The boy scampered to his side and, after getting a nod of permission, looked at that page of dense writing.

He read the title aloud. " 'Dragon's Tomb'?"

"It's a working title," Lance said with a shrug. "Typically, I don't come up with combination moves until I know for certain that the move would serve the Pokémon in its fully-evolved and actualized state. However, I've had extensive exposure to a Garchomp commanded by one of my other regional counterparts, and as such I know that Gabite would be able to execute this just as flawlessly post-evolution if he learns it now. Today, I'm going to have you observing this training session. As a warning, it will most likely take all day for him to even begin to get the timing down, and tomorrow I'll continue to drill it into him. I don't expect him to make any huge progress on it for a couple of weeks."

"A couple of weeks?!" Ash said.

"This is a rather complex set of moves," Lance said. "Something like Brock's Fury Dash? That's a simple concept translated into action. This? A member of the Gible line wouldn't do something like this naturally. It will have to be trained, honed within Gabite, and ultimately adapted for his own comfort. Polishing a move on this level will require focus and lots of practice on his part and adaptability on mine."

Ash made a noise of recognition.

"When you're ready to observe, please go stand by Mewtwo. You should all get as comfortable as you can."

The boy walked to the edge of the room and sat down, eyes fixed on Lance. Mewtwo turned to him; Lance could hear Ash quietly chittering to his companion.

The Dragon Master released Gabite in front of him. The Cave Pokémon burst out of his Pokéball and crooned in the air, landing in a crouch, eyes darting around him. When he realized he was alone with Lance, he turned to his Trainer and cocked his head to one side in confusion.

"Yes, we haven't had a solo training session in a while, have we?" Lance asked. "The others are still working with each other, but I finished drafting up a new tactic for us to attempt to cobble together. You're not too far off from evolving, if the teeth you're growing in are to be believed, and I want to get started with this."

Gabite growled in excitement. Lance had taught it a few more basic tactics to carry over and improve on upon evolution; this would be the first major set of training he had ever received.

"I have it written down here as Dragon's Tomb. It sounds similar enough to the two moves it's mostly based on, so I'll be coming up with a better title for it in order to obscure its nature better. For now we'll be using that," Lance said. "It is to be a hazard, mostly. Reshaping your environment in order to ensnare your opponent so you can damage it more with something else."

Lance had Gabite using Dragon Rage on the arena floor in as many angles as it could manage. It leapt in the air to spit out the globule of energy and watch the impact over and over again, sometimes merely dashing forward before springing up and other times hopping a couple of times before jumping as high into the air as he could.

"That's the one!" Lance called out as Gabite managed to leap from a complete standstill and spit the Dragon Rage on the ground, a huge dust cloud billowing around the point of impact. "Block all sightlines! No one can see what you're doing- now, I need you to Dig down and hollow out the ground in a two foot radius."

Gabite howled, leaping up, sending a Dragon Rage towards the ground, and using his momentum downwards to dive beneath the ground fluidly. Lance felt a slight rumble under the ground. He stomped on the floor; after a couple of seconds, Gabite poked his head up, confused by his interruption.

"Try one more time but be gentler. I could feel you that time, and I'm just a dinky human." Lance half-smiled. "Imagine using this move against a Dugtrio. It would know exactly what you were doing immediately."

Gabite grumbled before hoisting himself back to the surface, growling in preparation, and leaping once more, Dragon Rage already glowing in his mouth. It took Gabite a handful of tries before he figured out the right speed to be travelling in. Lance took a step forward onto what he knew to be hollow ground; he couldn't feel the difference and nodded in satisfaction.

"Alright, Gabite, do you want to take a short break from training so that you can practice this?"

The dragon crooned in agreement.

Lance wandered off to the side of the arena, leaving Gabite to Dig out the beginnings of his trap. He walked over to Ash and Mewtwo; Ash and Egg were watching Gabite practice with wide eyes, Mewtwo was looking over at Lance, vaguely impressed.

"Interesting?" Lance asked.

"I want to do that," Ash said resolutely. "I have ideas- I could do it. I bet I could."

Lance smirked. "I'll get you a notebook. We can discuss your ideas tomorrow."

* * *

 **Duplica is my favorite minor character from the Pokémon anime. I can't explain why. She is the only one whose name I remember without having to look her up (outside of Gym Leaders), and Mini-Dit brings me such joy.**

 **For those curious: Flygon's "Comet" move consists of Dragon Dance and Laser Focus to set up with Draco Meteor and Fire Punch for most of the damage. Right before impact, she uses Boomburst to both damage and startle her enemy. Charizard's "Fire Devil" was a Heat Wave set-up, a series of Flamethrowers and Dragon Pulses to give it substance, and a Fire Spin to control it.**

 **Remember that time I got so wrapped up in Shield that I didn't write for weeks? Guess who got PMD: DX and Animal Crossing. The only reason I'm writing at all is that I've already beaten the main plot of DX and I don't feel like time traveling and am thus taking AC slow. I've also been slowly hundred-percenting Breath of the Wild, which is inspiring a story based on it now. No worries; I plan to finish this story before even cracking into that seed.**

 **Speaking of this story finishing, I have two more chapters planned for _Wild Boy_ before it comes to a close (for now?). Between now and then, I'll be accepting any questions that you readers have and answering them in a final chapter of this story. Feel free to review or PM me any questions that you want answered in that last hurrah; I'll probably throw in some trivia about it as well.**


	9. Greater Than

**It occurs to me that I've fallen off of the bandwagon of replying to reviews; many apologies, and I'll get to as many as I can that require more than a simple "Thank you."**

 **I've gotten a lot of reviews asking for a longer story, one where Ash's journey is detailed and every aspect of his life dictated, and now I might have... the plans I didn't think I would have... I'm going to go into more detail at the end of _Wild Boy_ about my now budding plans for this story, but for now please just enjoy this chapter.**

* * *

Lance hoped that the absence of any other team members would help him speak with Wyvern. The set of her gaze on him said otherwise. She had always been the most challenging of his Dragonite to train, not only due to her parentage but also due to how stubborn she happened to be naturally. Sometimes, her attitude exasperated Lance, but right now he appreciated it.

"Ash came back yesterday," he told her.

Her eyes widened ever so slightly before she quickly regained her composure. Interesting.

"So you weren't expecting him to?" Lance prompted.

Wyvern huffed somewhat irately.

"At least one of us knew he was going to leave to begin with," Lance said with a wry grin. "How did you swing learning about that, anyhow?"

Wyvern gave him a deadpan look before her eyes darted towards Bulbasaur, who was curled up under the bench Lance was sitting in. The Seed Pokémon had seemed overly cautious about reuniting with Ash, opting to continue shadowing Lance wherever the Dragon Master went. Lance hadn't wanted to ask the boy about him yet; Ash was still settling in the new room that Lance had designated for him (it opened to an enclosed courtyard that Bruno had been using to help train Amber) and there didn't seem to be any reason to hurry that reunion.

"I didn't know you two were friends," Lance said, looking to Bulbasaur himself. The Pokémon gave an almost contrite growl, lying down more firmly before fixing Wyvern with wide eyes. Lance would almost describe them as adoring if he wanted to irritate his Dragonite.

"All that being said, I have something important to ask of you. I'm sure you didn't tell any of the others about Ash's daring escape plan, and I didn't expect you to. You didn't tell _me_ about them, even. I'm sure there are a few other things you've picked up on from being around him so often before he left."

Wyvern narrowed her eyes as she stared at him.

Lance examined Wyvern himself; she had been his final Dragonite, the one he acquired to form a full, perfect triad with Drakon, who had chosen him in Blackthorn's temple within Dragon's Den when he first started his journey almost two decades ago, and Coatl, who had been a gift from Drake after he first conquered Hoenn's Trainers' League. Wyvern had been a collaboration with Drayden of Unova, the result of finding two compatible dragons whose child could stand toe-to-toe with the ones he had been training for years as soon as possible. From the start, she had been serious about training, not inclined to relax as Coatl was or simply stern as Drakon could be. Wyvern had wanted to be the best immediately and didn't take being second-place for anything. Ironically, because of that, she was probably Lance's least-used Pokémon; he didn't want to dishonor her work with an unworthy opponent, and if a Pokémon couldn't crack through Coatl's trickery at the very least, it wouldn't stand a chance against Wyvern's craftiness and raw power. She had tamed fire almost completely by herself, the draconic almost as an afterthought. Strength ran through her veins. To not acknowledge that was foolish.

"Wyvern, you've been one of my most reliable partners throughout the years," Lance said. "As I have proven many times, I would trust you with my life. As such, I have a mission that only you can carry out.

"Above all other things, ensure that Ash is safe. "

Wyvern stared at him with blatant incredulity. She clearly hadn't expected such a request, and Lance could already see mutiny forming in her eyes.

"You have been the most proactive in defending him already," Lance said. "You refused to join us in battle if it meant leaving him unprotected, and I need that instinct serving him more than ever. This doesn't mean I am removing you from my team. It doesn't matter if it means being slightly less protected, there will always be a space for you. However, I have the feeling that there will be a time during which you may have to choose between my own safety and Ash's, and I need you to choose him. I have your brothers-in-arms to assist me, and I have no doubt that you will be able to return should you choose to. I need the same certainty when it comes to his life."

Wyvern growled quietly, slashing furrows into the ground. She looked at him unhappily. Lance had the feeling that she felt cornered, pressed between her loyalty to him and her pride in being trusted with so huge a task. Finally, she slowly nodded her head, a curl in her lip to show that she wasn't happy with this.

"You are greater than many before you," Lance said quietly, holding a hand out that Wyvern quickly took with a surprisingly gentle claw. "May you never have to act on this order."

* * *

Wyvern took on her role as Ash's protector with a grave sense of duty that Lance had expected but still found amusing. She would slink after the boy, somehow never quite garnering his attention with her persistence. More interestingly, at least to Lance, Bulbasaur had begun tentatively tagging behind Wyvern as much as he did Lance. Mewtwo had noted the Seed Pokémon first; it took Ash a few days to realize that the blue creature that trailed Lance's Dragonite was one that he had first befriended in Lavender Town. Lance hadn't been present for that particular reunion; what he gleaned from the others later was that Wyvern had sat Ash down and admonished him for close to half an hour about how hurt Bulbasaur had been at their departure and how team members relied on each other, no matter when they met. It was a subdued Ash that came to dinner that evening, Bulbasaur not quite tailing him in particular but still doggedly following behind with Wyvern bringing up the rear. The golden dragon snorted in Lance's direction, nodding to the two of them. Lance said nothing, just smiling at Wyvern briefly before turning his attention back to Ash.

Meanwhile, outside of the small bubble within the League building, something was shifting in the world. The Masters reported new occurrences almost daily, incidents as small as an entire population of Oddish that once lived happily just outside of Celadon retreating so deeply into the woods that Erika feared she would never meet them again to, most troublingly, the main island of the Seafoam Resorts having to shut down due to sudden freezing temperatures along its hiking trails. Lance wasn't too concerned by the loss of revenue- Kanto had never been built on tourism, and he knew that the family who ran the Seafoam Resorts rarely let themselves idle for more than a second before moving onto their next big business venture. Johto was perhaps even more insular than Kanto but still received its share of troubling news; Lance quickly scanned a report that Pryce, Johto's Ice Master, had sent him about a budding gang that tried to lay roots first at the Lake of Rage and then within a building in Mahogany Town. The old Master had easily driven them out of town, backed by his entire team.

He opened the next email, this one from Duplica. At first, he was confused; the House of Imite, which served as Duplica's home, performance hall, and Gym, was close enough to Saffron City that he expected Sabrina to take over the major purview of the area. Unless something happened in the house itself, Lance couldn't think of what sort of disaster would merit Duplica's report and not Sabrina's. He glanced through the email, the tenseness in his shoulders fading as he relaxed.

No bad news. Actually, rather good news, if what she reported was true.

Before he could reply to the message, Lance's doors opened and a young boy popped his head into the room. Ash's expectant gaze was soon followed by Mewtwo's; the purple Pokémon had stuck his head into the doorway much as Ash had. Egg was, as usual, balanced on Ash's head.

"Can I help any of you?" Lance asked, closing his emails and looking to them.

"We might have had an amazing, incredible idea? Could you come see?" Ash asked, extending the 'i' in 'might' for emphasis.

Lance chuckled before standing. "With a proposition like that, how could I say no?" Ash led Lance (tailed by Wyvern once more) down to a courtyard, where Amber and Fossil were quietly discussing something. Lance could see one of the Kabuto's claws flick almost nervously.

"What was your idea, then?" Lance prompted. "I assume it's whatever you've been refusing to tell anyone about for the past week."

Ash nodded almost solemnly. Lance managed to hold back a laugh at how serious he was trying to be despite physically vibrating with excitement.

"We've been training hard for a long time," Ash began, "and learned how to do a lot of things. One of those things is learning as many techniques as possible." He held up his Pokédex, already opened to Fossil's page of information. Lance raised an eyebrow as he saw the list of moves Fossil had access to.

"Fascinating how a couple of years can lead to so much development," Lance said. "He's learned practically everything that a Kabuto _can_ learn, it seems."

"That's what we thought! Master Lorelei gave us a book with most of the Pokémon that a Trainer could catch in it. There're a lot of numbers and stuff in it."

 _'It's the basic encyclopedia on many known species of Pokémon. It's meant to be a comprehensive introduction so that Trainers can decide if they want to capture and train specific species. A combined attempt at conservation and encouragement, some may say,'_ Mewtwo added. _'I was the one who read it cover to cover. Ash might have looked at the pictures a couple of times.'_

"I read some of it," Ash muttered. "I know the Pikachu one really well."

"So now that Fossil knows everything that he wants to, you're working on combination moves, I'm guessing? Is that what you need help with?"

Ash nodded fervently.

"So what were you thinking?" Lance asked, looking at Fossil, who was now scratching patterns into the ground.

"Well, Fossil's a li'l slow, right?"

"Kabuto aren't necessarily known for their speed, yes," Lance said. "I wouldn't say that they're the slowest creatures, I suppose, but I would generally agree with you."

"So! I thought that if he could go faster for a moment, he would be better at fighting. And then I thought that it would be cool if he could hang onto whoever he's fighting so that he doesn't have to think too hard about coming back to attack again. And- and! He could also smack 'em around while they're still trying to figure out where he's going or what he's doing!"

Ash was staring at Lance earnestly, his fists clenched by his face. He had at some point slipped into an excited squat. "Imagine how cool that would be!" he said, his voice squeaking in enthusiasm.

"Alright, let's break this down a bit," Lance said, maintaining a light professionalism for Ash's sake. "So, you want to develop a move with which Fossil will be able to move faster. You also want him to be able to cling to his enemies, as well as just hit them while still moving fast enough to avoid damage."

Ash nodded.

"Well, that's a pretty tall order, especially if he hasn't quite evolved yet," Lance said bluntly.

Ash's face fell dramatically. "So you don't think he can do it?" he asked.

"I believe he could try," Lance said. "What were you thinking he would travel quickly with?"

Ash consulted his Pokédex. "Well, he has Aqua Jet," Ash noted. "That lets you go pretty fast."

"It does let you go momentarily faster," Lance said. "How fast can he go with it?"

Ash shrugged. He turned to Fossil. "Hey Fossil! Could you-" he broke off to perform a series of whistles and chitters, waving his arms around for emphasis. Mewtwo rolled his eyes at the enthusiastic performance.

Fossil clicked back to him, scuttling to one side of the courtyard before cloaking himself in a stream of water and dashing forwards, straight towards Ash and Lance. Lance instinctively took a step back. Ash held his arms out; Fossil expertly disabled the coating of water seconds before he would have rammed into his Trainer and instead just landed in his arms, humming contently.

"Pretty good, right?" Ash said.

"It's definitely a good starting point." Lance noticed Amber watching them carefully. "Can Amber and Fossil have a quick race?"

Ash blinked. "Uhh..." He turned to Amber and shouted something over to her. She shrugged and stood up, brushing herself off. "She seems down," Ash said.

"Great. I need Amber to run towards us and Fossil to do exactly what he just did to you."

Ash cocked his head to the side. "You want him to Aqua Jet and then land in her arms?" he clarified.

"If he could, yes," Lance said.

Ash looked down to the Kabuto in his arms. "That sound good, bud?"

Fossil waved his legs in the air, squirming out of Ash's grip.

"I'll count down; start when I say go," Lance said.

On cue, Fossil re-cloaked himself in water and darted towards Amber, this time.

"Amber, try to get past the field before Fossil gets to the halfway mark!" Lance barked out. Startled, Amber darted forwards in a Quick Attack, easily outpacing Fossil and snatching him out of the air before he could gain too much momentum.

Ash's face fell.

"That's what I was afraid of," Lance said. "Aqua Jet gives Fossil a boost, yes, but if another Pokémon is already faster than him and has a move that similarly energizes them, he wouldn't have that advantage any more. Priority moves are common enough that it would be a problem."

"Aw man," Ash muttered. "It would have been so cool."

"You can still work on something similar," Lance said. "It would work as a one-time surprise move, for sure. Kabuto aren't known for their speed, after all; however, as soon as you've shown that off, your opponent would be expecting it. Fossil's entire battle style would have to reflect that. Also, if I'm not mistaken, Fossil's pretty high-level, at least from when he started."

"Hmm?" Ash looked at his Pokédex again. "I mean, I guess. He's level forty-eight."

"How many mock battles have you included Fossil in?" Lance asked.

Ash's face turned red. "Well, I uh... He doesn't like fighting too much," he mumbled.

Lance hummed in acknowledgement; Fossil was a rather laidback Pokémon generally. "It may help your strategy to have him battle a couple of times," he said vaguely.

"Huh?"

Lance walked over to the other side of the battlefield and flicked a wrist; his Pokéball bounced on the ground and released Deino, who crooned excitedly upon seeing where she was.

"Well, Deino's been needing a stretch," Lance said. "Why not have a nice spar? We're not going until exhaustion, just until... something happens, I guess."

Lance wondered if that was too suspicious, but Ash was gloriously clueless to any of Lance's ulterior motives and immediately sprang up, excited to battle one of his mentors, calling Fossil to his side.

Deino hopped back and forth on her feet, chirring in anticipation.

"So Ash, a couple of things before we start," Lance said once Fossil had scuttled into position in front of Ash. "You've known Deino since you've been here. What you might not have known is that Deino had just joined my team right before you arrived. The Unova Champion gave me her egg, and that first time I met you was meant to be my first actual training session with her."

Ash turned wide eyes onto Deino, who was crouched and smirking at him.

"Are you ready to test how all of you have grown?" Lance asked. "Deino hasn't completely mastered combination moves yet, but she's been training hard to become the most powerful dragon she can be. Will you take the challenge?"

"Yes!" Ash burst out, stomping his feet on the ground. "Man, oh man, this is so cool! You got this, Fossil!" Fossil clicked back to him in response.

"Stand by, Deino!" Lance called out. "Ash, you may have the first move."

"Sounds good! Fossil, get to her with Aqua Jet and hit her with a Giga Drain!" Ash called out.

Fossil crooned in response before covering himself in water and streaking through the air towards Deino. Already Lance could see glowing green tendrils, roots and vines that burst and reached towards Deino with urgency.

"Dodge as best as you can; counter with Dragon Breath where necessary," Lance instructed. Deino barked in acknowledgement before shooting forwards, a light purple glow emanating from her throat. Deino herself wasn't too speedy but still managed to dodge half of the Giga Drain that flew towards her; the last few glowing vines wrapped around her foot, dragging her towards Fossil, but she snarled in response and blew an unearthly flame straight towards Fossil. The Kabuto screeched in pain, still managing to cling to Deino and sap some of her health away.

"Hang on, Fossil! Use Ancient Power to make a shield!" Ash said.

Lance furrowed his brow, trying to understand what Ash's command meant. Deino growled uncertainly as she noticed Lance's expression.

Fossil summoned a silvery orb of energy that he quickly split into multiple beams that shot into the earth. Clods of dirt and rock raised into the air and hovered around Fossil, as if an ill-formed armor.

Lance raised an eyebrow. He hadn't realized that Ancient Power had the finesse to summon earth to its user. "No matter. Deino, get the rest of those vines off of you with a Slam and let's boost you a little bit- Focus Energy and Work Up until he does something with the Ancient Power."

Deino grunted, leaping into the air and flipping, dislodging the final bits of Giga Drain from where it was withering on her leg. When she landed back on the ground, Deino crouched down, eyes fixed on where Fossil stood prepared with his Ancient Power-controlled rocks. After glowing red and then white, she slipped into a firmer position, muscles tensed and ready to move when she was told to.

"Throw them at her face!" Ash yelled.

Fossil clicked before sending the Ancient Power flying towards Deino.

"Dodge! Use Assurance on anything that you can't!" Lance barked out.

Deino snarled, leaping back to avoid the first mess of dirt and pebble. Immediately, she whipped around and threw her body at another that was zooming towards her, shoving it out of her way, before twisting back around and stomping at another, the point of impact glowing black against her claws. Deino wasn't quite agile enough to dodge the last collection of detritus that Fossil threw at her.

"Hyper Voice!"

Deino looked up, gave Fossil a baleful look, took a deep breath, and screeched out a single, pure note that visibly rippled through the air. It wasn't as flawless as Altaria's was, falling apart much more quickly, but Lance knew it was enough when Fossil seemed to shudder and take a step back, the note rattling in his shell.

"Now, quick-charge-release Dragon Pulse until I say to stop!" Lance said.

Deino chirped, a bead of draconic energy forming in her mouth. Before it was fully formed, she blew it towards Fossil, running towards him.

"Dodge it, Fossil! Use Aqua Jet if you have to!" Ash cried out. Lance could hear worry start to creep into his voice.

"Stay confident, Ash!" Lance called out to him even as Deino spat out another small burst of Dragon Pulse at Fossil, who frantically scuttled away. "Confidence might be all you have left. It may not grant you a win automatically, but losing your confidence will most likely lose you the battle."

Ash nodded, taking a deep breath to re-center himself. "Right, okay. Fossil, make a hole in the ground to hide in!"

Fossil scrabbled at the grass until he had himself a shallow furrow he could flatten himself into.

"Aim for him; full-charge this time," Lance said. Deino stood firmly as she allowed this Dragon Pulse to swell up to its normal size before spitting it towards Fossil.

"Squish down! Squish down! Harden!" Ash yelped. Fossil tried his best but didn't quite dodge out of the way enough, and the Dragon Pulse ricocheted him out of his makeshift trench and sent him skidding across the ground.

"Fossil! Are you okay?!" Ash yelled, forcing himself to stay in his Trainer's box while Fossil waved his legs frantically in the air.

"Deino, stand down for a moment," Lance said. Deino huffed before sitting where she stood.

Fossil was lying on his back, leg twitches getting weaker as he lost energy. "C'mon Fossil, don't give up!" Ash started muttering. "You can do it, I know you can. You're the best Fossil that I could ask for, and I believe in you! C'mon, bud, let's finish this."His voice had grown louder with every sentence, and soon he was shouting earnestly at his fallen friend.

Fossil gave a high-pitched whine as he tried to flip himself back over.

"I know," Ash said. "It's hard, yeah. But we can get through this! We can get stronger together- we always have!"

Fossil's next call was somehow even shriller than his last, followed by a much louder blare that had Lance wincing slightly. The Dragon Master wondered if he had pushed Ash and Fossil slightly too far, if this hadn't been what the boy and his team needed, but he didn't worry for too long as soon, Fossil began to glow with a bright white light.

Ash gasped. "Lance! What's happening?! Why is he doing that?"

Lance smiled. "He heard you, and he wants to be his best for you," Lance said, watching as Fossil's body elongated, as his front legs grew massive scythes and his body shifted into two parts. Ash watched with wild eyes as the Pokémon he used to hold as if it were a doll now stood almost as tall as Lance himself, a spindly, wily looking creature with a crescent-shaped head that hid black eyes that darted back and forth.

Ash's Pokédex activated as if on command. _"Congratulations!"_ it said robotically. _"Your Kabuto has evolved into Kabutops!"_

"Kabutops..?" Ash said, looking from the machine in his pocket to the Pokémon that his friend had evolved into. "Is that you, Fossil?" he asked when the Pokémon turned, recognizing his species name. He nodded to Ash before clicking something to him. Ash seemed surprised but nodded all the same.

"Is something wrong?" Lance asked.

"No, Kabutops just asked to be known by his species name," Ash said. "Something about outgrowing the Project name. I kind of agree." He crouched back down. "Anyhow, are you ready to keep going? 'Cause we are!"

Lance chuckled. "Of course. Try and use this battle to figure out Kabutops's new skill set and strengths," he said. "Deino! Back to quick-charge, stay moving."

Ash had taken his Pokédex back out and was reading through something before he noticed something that made his face light up. "Kabutops, get up close with Deino with Aqua Jet and use Slash at her legs!" he said, pointing towards Deino.

Kabutops skidded into an Aqua Jet, water somehow materializing from beneath his feet as he neatly swerved and ran straight for the small dragon. He raised his scythes and cried out as he slashed downwards. He didn't quite hit Deino's legs exactly; Deino was so short in comparison now that the Slash attack threw her completely off-balance, smacking her in the side and sending her sprawling to the ground.

Deino snapped back up, snarling more ferociously now. Lance could see spittle dripping from her mouth; something had switched inside her, dulling her typical cheerfulness and encouraging the feral rage that her kind was known for.

"Deino, stay focused," Lance called out, but instead of calming down as she usually did, Deino let out a loud howl. She sounded desolate, infuriated, and eager all in one, the unearthly notes echoing through the enclosed courtyard. Kabutops took a step back, uncertainty pressing on his posture, but Ash didn't have any of that hesitation. Rather, his eyes glowed and a wide smile slowly spread across his face as he fixed his eyes on Deino's small form.

It came as no surprise to either human present when Deino started to glow.

While Kabutops's evolution had been as graceful as evolution usually was, Deino's was from the start violent. Her body grotesquely engorged in size, her head following close behind before growing even larger than it should have been. A split formed at her sternum, following the curve of her neck until it reached the tip of her head, splitting it in two. The scales on her back seemed to shift into feathery protrusions; her body stopped transforming for a second, form undulating slightly as a final minor adjustment was made, and the glow of evolution shattered off of her as though made of glass. Two heads drooped over clawed feet, panting from exertion. The two heads both looked up and stared at Kabutops for a second. She took a step forwards, growling lowly.

Lance stepped forward. "I forfeit this match," he said formally before leaving his Trainer's box to walk over to the newly evolved Zweilous. The two-headed dragon snarled at Lance before visibly double-taking and beginning to squabble with herself over almost harming her Trainer.

"What?! But- but that was so cool! Kabutops and... uh-" [Ash checked his Pokédex quickly] "- Zweilous could have kept going after evolving!"

Lance smiled almost indulgently at Ash. "You saw how quickly Kabutops moved after evolving, right?"

Ash blinked. "Uh, yeah. He got a lot faster, I guess?"

"Exactly. Any training the two of you did before he evolved will need to be fine-tuned to make sure he is as comfortable with his new form as he was his old form. And I'm afraid I would have called that spar no matter what, as Zweilous is in no shape to battle after that evolution."

Ash winced, looking at the dragon. "Is she going to be okay?" he asked, worried.

"I'm sure she will, after some rest," Lance said with a sigh. "I'm not exactly looking forward to her next evolution, but she'll be fine for now."

Ash gave him a confused look at that but didn't say anything. Lance merely put a hand on one of Zweilous's heads and carefully scratched at the base of her skull. The dragon gave a low hiss but didn't attempt to move her head away.

Lance recalled Zweilous thankfully without too much fuss. He turned back to Ash. "Well, do you think that Aqua Jet combination move idea might work now? You had Kabutops using it, as well as a few other unorthodox moves, in that match just now."

Ash cocked his head to a side. "I just used moves the way they could be used," he said, puzzled.

"You used them as they could be, yes," Lance said, "but not the way they usually are. A lot of Trainers learn from watching other Trainers' Pokémon, and because of that they're usually tied down to an ultra-specific way of using those moves. You aren't. You learned your Pokémon's capabilities by yourself, meaning that you've explored every possible use of a move's power. There's a strength there that even I can't master. You're a very intuitive Trainer, Ash; with time, you could be one of the greatest Trainers that has ever lived."

Ash's eyes glowed at the possibility.

* * *

"Are you telling me that you've been here for years and this is the first time you've had ice cream?"

Ash was too busy devouring the bowl of dessert in front of him to respond.

Mewtwo glanced at Ash's voracity and coughed out a snicker. _'It's probably not within the diet regimen that the Fighting Master wrote for us. He has become more lenient as of late, it seems.'_

Lance remembered the low discussion he had with Bruno about teaching Ash how to protect himself. His own ice cream soured in his mouth. "Of course. He is rather strict on that, isn't he?"

Mewtwo just nodded, helping himself to another spoonful and visibly relishing it.

"Cynthia would be so upset if she knew that I kept this away from you," Lance said. "I swear, she must have been weaned on it, with as much as she consumes."

 _'Weaned?'_ Mewtwo seemed to turn the word around in his mind, trying to glean its meaning from that singular use.

"Weaning, literally, is when a human child stops drinking a mother's milk and eats more solid food. Pokémon generally don't need to wean; the equivalent there would be a younger Pokémon gaining its independence and leaving their mother's care. As a note, humans aren't normally weaned to ice cream."

Mewtwo huffed at that, smirking a little. Ash was still lost to them in his bowl of chocolate.

 _'We never had to be weaned,'_ Mewtwo said. _'We were raised on berries when we had our own facilities. No milk.'_

Lance hummed, trying not to look eager at this tentative bit of information.

 _'Ash always liked the pechas. I was more of a fan of rawst berries then.'_ His brow furrowed slightly. _'I don't think I like them anymore.'_

"I'll note that down," Lance said.

Mewtwo nodded at that. _'I don't think Ash likes pechas as much anymore, either,'_ he said, almost conspiratorially.

"Is there a reason why?" Lance asked.

Mewtwo's gaze went stony. Lance wondered if he wasn't in the mood to speak more, but before he could change the topic Mewtwo said, _'They were incentives. They had books, notes, observations on everything that the Projects liked and didn't like, and they put them through their mazes, goaded by the promise of something good and the threat of something bad.'_

"Like lab rats? Carrot-and-stick?"

 _'Like lab rats,'_ Mewtwo agreed. _'There were scientists and there were tutors.'_

"Buttheads," Ash piped up. Lance looked over, startled; Ash had long since finished his ice cream, it seemed, but he was still sitting at the table, listening in on the conversation in front of him.

 _'...that. The scientists actually cared for the Projects' well-being. They wanted them healthy, or smart, or functional. The tutors acted as though they cared as much, but they were easy to read and they didn't care. They wanted something else from the Projects. They wanted something else from only two of the Projects. The others were useful but extraneous.'_

"Who were these tutors?" Lance asked.

 _'Idiots. Buffoons, all four of them. Serfs that fancied themselves equals to their lord.'_ Mewtwo's lip curled and he glared at the empty bowl in front of him. Before Lance could say anything, Ash reached out a hand and gently tapped Mewtwo's arm. He snapped out of it, closed his eyes, and seemed to recollect himself. _'There were only two at first. They did not tell the Projects what their names were but gave themselves childish nicknames as if it were a great favor. One said that he was to be called Mister. The one who the Projects saw the most often called herself Ari.'_

"Ari? Was that the one with berry-colored hair and eyes like stars?" Lance said, reciting what Ash had stated years prior.

Ash nodded. "Cheri berry hair," he clarified, "and she would stare at- like lab rats. Like lab rats."

 _'Lab rats,'_ Mewtwo echoed again. _'Their first test was control. To tell the scientists that had nurtured them that they did not know why they were there, that they were to return to where they came from with only the knowledge that they were involved with a very big thing that had unfortunately failed. It worked. The tutors were shocked that it worked. They didn't seem to think it mattered if it could have been done or not.'_

"It would have hurt them," Ash said. "Of course it mattered."

 _'It didn't until recently, and you know that,'_ Mewtwo said. _'After that there were two other tutors that would come. One fancied himself murderous but recoiled at blood. The other acted the fool but played his part to perfection. They taught their arts. They were useless at teaching their arts.'_

"We learned," Ash said. "We got around it, somehow."

 _'Did we, Ash?'_ Mewtwo turned to Ash, radiating a deep exhaustion. _'We weren't ourselves when any of the tutors came to work with us. We buried ourselves as though it would protect us. We couldn't do anything against any of them.'_

"Yes, we could," Ash rebutted. "And we did! When they brought the Bad Man, we were able to get them back and escape, like we always planned to!"

 _'The Menace didn't expect us to do that. Face it, we were just lucky, Ash. If the Menace had been any more cautious, we wouldn't have been able to leave and we would still be trapped there, still be doing whatever horrible things they wanted us to do, and not sitting at a table eating ice cream!'_

"But we aren't!" Ash yelled, standing up and slamming his hands into the table. His bowl rattled. "We aren't, and you sometimes forget that! We _did_ make it out, and we _did_ find a better place, and we don't have to think about any alternative to that!"

There was a long pause then.

 _'The Menace fancied himself a kingmaker,'_ Mewtwo said quietly. _'And you were his crown prince. I was to be your prized possession. A weapon with no match, one that would ascertain your throne simply by existing. He would rule with your face as his mask. How is that not supposed to affect me?'_

Ash was quiet, unwilling to meet either Mewtwo's or Lance's eyes. "I don't know."

Mewtwo gracefully disentangled himself from the chair he had been sitting in. _'I'll be in the courtyard,'_ he said quietly.

"Mewtwo, before you go, your speech is getting very good," Lance said. "It's much closer to Universal than the faux speech that Psychics use. Your improvement is astounding, honestly."

Mewtwo seemed taken aback by the unexpected compliment. _'Thank you, Master Lance,'_ he said.

"What is your current berry preference? I'll have some brought in for tonight," Lance said, looking at the melted mess in his bowl.

Pause. _'I'm partial to aguav berries at the moment,'_ Mewtwo said quietly.

"What?! Those are disgusting! How can you like them?"

 _'I'm sorry your taste isn't as refined as mine is,'_ Mewtwo said, sticking his nose into the air with a theatrical haughtiness.

"Ugh, gross. Nanabs are where it's at." Ash shook his head in disgust.

"Nanab berries are also very good with ice cream," Lance said with a smile. Ash's eyes widened at the possibility.

* * *

"Can you believe that there's only another year and a half before we get to go out and be actual Trainers?"

Gary was perched on Wyvern's back as she laid out in the sun. She had rather grumpily taken on the role of children's playset when Gary and Anabel teleported over, though she was much more welcoming to the young girl than she was to the firecracker that was Gary Oak. Even now, Anabel was perched by Wyvern's neck, gently leaning against her head rather than sitting upright. Lance was in a separate corner, quietly observing to make sure that Wyvern didn't snap at any of the children.

Wyvern was actually curled up around Ash himself, and he stroked one of her massive clawed hands before frowning and looking to Gary. "You're already thinking about heading out?"

Gary looked incredulous. "Well, _duh_. We're not all lucky enough to be able to start training early or have as many team members as you've got already. I'm psyched to go out and see the world! Catch some friends! Make some rivals! The list goes on and on, Ashy-boy!"

"Don't call me that, Gare-bear."

"Well," Anabel spoke up, cutting off the inevitable argument between the two boys. "I'm excited to see what's in the world. I'm probably going to end up working with Scott at the Battle Frontier when I grow up, so I want to find a team to help me do that."

"That's cool," Ash said.

Gary stared at him. "You told me off for just wanting to leave Pallet Town and complimented her on wanting a _job_ when we're _eight_. You sure you don't have a crush on each other?"

Vehement denials followed. Gary snickered; Wyvern looked over to him with one lazy opened eye and lightly smacked the back of his head with a wing. The boy yelped and nearly fell off the Dragonite, grumbling as he managed to keep his balance at the last second.

"Why do both of you want to leave home, anyhow?" Ash asked, staring at the sky. "It seems... I dunno. Not scary, but not fun either."

"It would be _exciting_ ," Gary said. "I don't know if I'm gonna be a Trainer forever but it's- it's better than just sitting at home, doing my lessons. And Eevee's doing well for now but he could be growing so much more if we weren't stuck at home. There aren't enough other Trainers or Pokémon to test ourselves against in Pallet Town."

"It's the same for me," Anabel added. "I want to see the world that I see in photos. I want to meet more Pokémon to bond with and grow close to. I want to see more than just Saffron City and the Pokémon League."

Ash grew pensive over his friends' statements. "The world is so sad though," he said. "It's not as nice as it used to be."

Gary sighed. "I guess. But wouldn't it be better to have friends, to get better with others? I think I want to improve with others, instead of staying home for the rest of my life."

"Does that mean you aren't going on a journey?" Anabel finally brought up what she and Gary must have been thinking.

Ash stiffened. "I don't know," he said. "I want to. It would be fun. I'd love to meet new Pokémon and Trainers. But the world is so big and there are so many bad people in it. I want to get better and be better, but I don't want to have to meet the bad ones."

"That's the tricky part, isn't it?" Gary said. "There are bad people, there are good people, there are dangerous things, there are moments that your entire life builds up towards. How do you know what matters if you don't let yourself try out everything you can reach?"

Ash looked at Gary with wide eyes. "I didn't think about it that way," he said.

"Hmph! That's no way for my rival to be acting!" Gary said, sticking his nose in the air. Lance suddenly realized where Mewtwo had learned that gesture.

" _Your_ rival?" Anabel repeated.

"Of course! Ashy-boy's going to be my number one rival and the person I'm aiming to beat. What do you say, Ash? When we go out on our journeys, we'll meet up time from time and test our skills out on each other, and our final battle will be at the Indigo League itself!" Gary's eyes were shining.

"Only if you stop calling me that," Ash grumbled, leaning against Wyvern's arm.

"I could be your rival too," Anabel said, "but what if we just traveled together, Ash? It would be more fun with more friends around, and Eevee likes you well enough."

"Is that the only reason why you'd want to ask him to travel with you, Ana-susannah?" Gary said, smirking widely.

"How did you even come up with that?" Ash asked, eyeing Gary as though he had lost his mind.

"It rhymes and sounds silly."

"Shut up, Gary!"

Gary fell silent immediately upon seeing Anabel's furious blush.

"You want to travel with me?" Ash asked, sounding doubtful.

Anabel shrugged. "It seems like it would be fun. Plus, Scott would probably feel more comfortable with me travelling with someone. I bet Mister Lance would feel the same."

Lance looked up from where he was sitting with his journal of moves. He had been looking to see where to start with Zweilous's training, though the dark/dragon-type had taken to napping under his desk still. "Don't point fingers at me, Anabel. It's Ash's choice." He noticed the panicked look in Anabel's eye. "That being said," he said hurriedly, "it may be more fun to start out with companions. You can gain a lot of confidence from just being around a friend." Ash grew thoughtful at Lance's remarks.

Gary snorted. "We're all whipped, aren't we?"

"Did Blue teach you what that means?" Lance flipped to a new page to continue with observations on Zweilous.

"Not really, but he says it a lot. Did I use it right?"

"You should ask him when he comes to pick you up."

* * *

The first sign that something was wrong was that nothing was wrong. Drakon had for some reason insisted on staying out of his Pokéball, which was rather out of character for him. There was a tension in the air, one that Lance thought was born from his own exhaustion at trying to keep up with all of the updates that Masters throughout every League-associated region were reporting.

The second sign that something was wrong was that Lance's office door was slightly open when he returned, Drakon close on his heels.

The third sign was that Drakon was starting to growl quietly.

Lance opened the door, wondering what had happened. His office seemed mostly untouched except for one package that had been neatly placed in the center of his desk. There was a note on it in an unfamiliar hand: _"Open immediately. Time-sensitive."_

"Drakon, do you want to take care of this for me?" Lance asked. Drakon immediately sprang forth, slashed the package open, and threw the box to the ground, the note and cardboard shredding from the movement. A ratty looking walkie-talkie fell to the ground, clattering loudly. It immediately began buzzing, unintelligible noises pouring out of it before settling into a much quieter, more consistent static.

 _"Lance."_ The voice on the other end was immediately recognizable.

The Dragon Master's eyes widened before narrowing as he snatched the walkie-talkie up.

"What is this?" he growled into it. Drakon echoed his words with a snarl, instinctively recognizing Lance's primal, roiling anger.

 _"Now now, that's not very polite,"_ Giovanni's voice crackled, amusement somehow communicating through the outdated device in Lance's hand. _"We were always so cordial. I would have even called us friends at one point."_

"Be as that may, you are no longer welcome in any region that I serve," Lance snarled. "What is the meaning of this?!"

Lance could hear Giovanni click his tongue. _"Shame, shame. Very well, then, we'll go straight to business. Judging by your demeanor, I assume that you know who I came from and what I am. I ask you for my property. I believe you have been hiding them underneath my nose these past few years?"_

"What are you talking about?" Lance snapped. "I have nothing of yours."

 _"On the contrary, Mr. Champion. You have my most precious possessions hidden away in that maze you call the Indigo League building. My terms are simple: return them to me and I leave both Kanto and Johto forever, or I take them from you with whatever force I can muster."_

"Go fuck yourself, Giovanni," Lance said before passing the walkie-talkie to Drakon. "Thunderpunch," he ordered while leaving his office.

Drakon smirked before taking the walkie-talkie from his Trainer, electrifying his whole arm, and smashing the device to pieces beneath his claw.

"Ah, Master Lance!" one of the League employees squealed as he accidentally walked into her. She quickly readjusted a pair of glasses that had slid down her nose, shoving it back up her face, as well as grabbing at a baseball cap, though not before a lock of dark pink hair fell onto her face.

"Apologies," he called over his shoulder, barely registering her. "Watch out for the Dragonite; he'll be coming along shortly." He whistled a loud, high-pitched note that echoed down the League halls before sprinting towards Ash's room.

"O-okay," she muttered as he hurried off.

Lance quickly dialed Lorelei, Bruno, and Agatha. Only Bruno picked up. "Bruno, no time. Ash is in trouble. Prepare for a breach somewhere within the League building. Try your best not to alert anyone else."

Bruno simply grunted before hanging up.

When Lance burst into the courtyard, he noticed Wyvern once again curled up on the grass and around Ash. Mewtwo was calmly hovering nearby, legs crossed, as Egg, Kabutops, Bulbasaur, and Amber seemed to be idly smacking a volleyball around. Wyvern immediately whipped her head up, alert instantly. Drakon growled something to her. Ash's eyes widened; Lance cursed mentally as he remembered Ash's lingual abilities.

"L-Lance? What's going on?" he stuttered.

Lance was breathing heavily from his rush to the courtyard. "I'm sorry, Ash," he said.

"Sorry for what? What's happening?!"

"Mewtwo, I can't keep my promise to you. You can't stay here anymore. I don't know how, but Giovanni found out where you are and is most likely on his way here right now."

 _'What?!'_ Mewtwo stared at Lance with wide eyes, stock-still even while hovering.

"He sent a message demanding that I hand you over or he would come to take you. It isn't safe here for you. You have to go somewhere, anywhere."

Mewtwo seemed on the verge of panicking. _'Where?! Where could we go that he wouldn't know?'_

Lance was silent in his helplessness. Desperately, he turned to Wyvern, whose expression had gone glassy and distant.

"Wyvern, you know your order," Lance said hoarsely. "I'm sorry to you as well. I should have known something like this could happen."

Wyvern gave a mournful cry before closing her eyes. When they opened again, they were stony and resolute. Lance quietly approached her, a bracelet holster containing only her Pokéball in his hand. He clasped it around her wrist and tightened it as firmly as he could.

"You are greater than many who came before you," Lance whispered to her, his throat closing in some combination of regret, guilt, and pride. "I will see you again." It was a promise that Lance clung to in his heart.

Wyvern nodded silently, staring at the contraption around her arm with undisguised hatred.

Lance's wrist communicator rang. He immediately activated it; Lorelei and Bruno were on the same screen, looking rattled.

 _"Lance! Bruno came to find me- we have a security breach at the south end. We've been able to hold some of them off but there are too many- some are probably heading towards you. Agatha went to try and slow them down at the very least."_ Something caught Bruno's attention; he tapped Lorelei on the shoulder. She looked off of the screen for a second and narrowed her eyes, throwing out another Pokéball without even fully registering what she was seeing. _"Dewgong, freeze them in place!- We'll try and finish this here and come help you as soon as we can."_ The call cut off when Lorelei whipped around to command her Jynx elsewhere, slamming the screen of her communication device down.

"Shit," Lance muttered. "Shit, fuck, goddamn fucking _bitch_." He began to grab for team members, sending out Coatl to hide on the roof as a last resort and instructing Altaria to deliver a hastily scrawled order to the keepers of Mount Silver.

Wyvern had by then picked up Ash, Amber, and Egg and hurried them onto her back. Ash had returned Kabutops and Bulbasaur as neither of them could cling to the Dragonite very well, and Mewtwo hovered beside them. With a loud howl, Wyvern took off, gaining altitude as quickly as she could.

"Go!" Lance screamed at them, gesturing Wyvern off. She seemed uncertain, not quite wanting to abandon Lance to the situation, torn in knowing that his previous order would have her leaving as soon as possible.

Drakon had whipped around towards the hallway, snarling almost rabidly as he heard the murderous bays and pounding feet that were storming towards them. Lance immediately released as many of his dragons as he could, climbing onto Exeggutor's back when the peculiarly long-necked Pokémon knelt down for him.

Giovanni appeared in a swirl of sand and wind before any of his Pokémon made themselves known. Before the man could even say anything, Drakon fired a pinpoint Hyper Beam right at his feet, stopping him in his tracks. A three-headed Pokémon poked himself out of the ground to summon a Protect shield around his Trainer to prevent further sniping before glaring at the giant dragon that dare attempt to harm him.

"Lance of Blackthorn!" he roared. "You steal from me my property _and_ my reputation and you expect no repercussions?"

"You would stoop so low as to claim ownership over a child?" Lance yelled back. "A traitorous bastard and criminal you may be, but I never thought you were an incompetent fool until now."

Giovanni's Dugtrio narrowed his eyes at the insult and dug forward as though to harm the human that insulted its master; before it could get even close, Wyvern swooped down and bathed it in a liberal sea of draconic flame, twisting back into the air immediately as Ash loudly whooped from her back. Kingdra followed the attack up with a powerful Hydro Pump that blasted the Dugtrio backwards, where he stalled to regain his breath.

"Foolish creature," Giovanni muttered, returning the tired Pokémon quickly. "You would keep a father away from his son, Dragon Master?" he called back, looking somehow victorious at this false trump card.

"I am more that boy's father than you could ever be," Lance growled. He grabbed as many Pokéballs off of his belt as he could and threw them all out around him. "No holds barred! Capture or eliminate!"

The handful of Pokémon that Lance had summoned to his side surged forward, each somehow weaving between the others' moves in an improvised unified attack. Almost immediately, each attack was cut-off by a member of Giovanni's own team, hidden in the Sandstorm that seemed to surround him like a cloak. Gabite had surged forward with a Dragon Claw only to be shoved backwards by a towering Garchomp with a ferocious underbite and dusky scales. Kingdra was being held by a massive Nidoking, while Haxorus's Dual Chop was countered by a claw that seemed to glisten with noxious fluid from a Nidoqueen. Charizard was circling a dangerous looking Krookodile, neither side willing to give in and neither willing to make the first move. Salamence's wings were being held within the claws of a Gliscor that had sprung from the ceiling to land neatly on his back. Drakon had gotten the closest to the corrupted former Master and was being firmly held in place by a massive Rhyperior, though Lance could see that he had refused to give in and was angrily pushing at his foe.

Giovanni took a step forward and around the warring Pokémon; when Lance's team attempted to leap after him, the corresponding members of Giovanni's team instantly moved to counter. It seemed like a stalemate.

"Give up, Lance," Giovanni called out. "Even with the rest of my compatriots distracting the others who could have helped you, I can conquer you. This didn't need to happen. All I wanted was to have my son back. A happy reunion- wouldn't that have been so sweet to witness?" His voice dripped with contempt.

"Funny how much you're insisting he's your _son_ now," Lance spat. "I thought he was a _plaything_ , a possession to throw a fit over like the child you are. Your days are numbered, Giovanni, and that's not only because you dared to step foot into the lands under _my_ jurisdiction." His blood was pumping, a fierce howl echoing in the back of his mind. "You so dared to force a child under your will, to bend and break a living being to fit into your selfish plots, and for what? Power? What power would it be that you sought? There is no joy in conquest."

"And that's where you're wrong, Lance!" Giovanni crowed. "Power is a beautiful and exacting mistress. She demands more and more from us all- and finally, we are in an era in which we can twist everything to match what she wants! I created the Chosen One, and I created the tool through which he will exact his will on the world! Everything around us is waking up again, and we shall return to our most primordial as the world settles once more. I caused this, Lance. Without me, we would have continued on in mediocrity or consumed by the world. I have ascended mortality- I am no longer human- I am a _god_ , a shaper of the earth itself _._ " He took another step; the Pokémon around him shifted, Lance's dragons inching closer and closer with every agonizing step.

"Gods are never worshiped as they want to be," Lance responded. "They demand rites and sacrifice and all people have deigned to give them is an acknowledgement of their existence and ignorance. Why would you want that for yourself? What joy is there to be had there?"

"Through me, the world has a hero. The world shall turn to him, and he shall turn to me," Giovanni said. His eyes were wide, mad. "I have succeeded where generations before me have failed. I will be the inspiration to the sculptor, the voice that whispers into the ear of the artist, and you- you are merely a person who dares to stand in my way." Giovanni's face twisted into a mask of hatred. "Stand down, Lance of Blackthorn," he said, spitting out Lance's name as though it was the poisonous insanity that spilled from his lips. "Stand down, and watch the world be made once more."

"I would rather die than stand down to you," Lance said, his draconic aura flaring up and filling him with an undying warmth.

"Then you shall!" Giovanni leapt forward, flinging a Pokéball at Lance that opened to release a Sandslash. The Pokémon looked to Lance, eyes hooded. She seemed to have been briefed on her purpose.

"You would force one of your team members to do the most heinous task in your stead?" Lance asked, eyeing the Mouse Pokémon as she stalked towards him slowly, almost reluctantly. "You are a coward as well."

"Coward I may be, but fool I am not," Giovanni said with a maniacal smirk.

Lance noticed a shift in shadow behind the man, who was intently looking between his Pokémon and his quarry, undoubtedly savoring every moment. "I wouldn't be so sure," he said softly.

Giovanni's eyes flickered back to him; for a brief moment, true confusion crossed his face.

"Body Slam!" Lance called out loudly.

Zweilous snarled in discordant harmony before slamming fully into Giovanni and bringing him to the ground, recognizing him as the main threat.

Pandemonium broke loose as Giovanni's Pokémon turned to their Trainer, bewildered by the sudden appearance of yet another enemy and worried for the human that commanded them. Immediately, Lance's dragons were able to strike once more: Gabite slashed Garchomp across the face, Kingdra shot Nidoking into Nidoqueen, releasing Haxorus to leap after them with a Dragon Pulse forming in his mouth. Charizard leaped forward to slam Krookodile's head into the ground and immediately bathe him in flame, and Salamence flung Gliscor against a courtyard wall by wresting his wings out from her loosening grasp and slamming her head with a Steel Wing. Drakon had finally broken out of Rhyperior's grip just long enough to slip into Agility, dash over to where Zweilous had Giovanni momentarily pinned, and grab the man as he tried to stand, letting loose a Thunder Wave to further prevent him from escaping. Drakon somehow Wrapped his limbs and tail around the now barely struggling human and turned to Lance with his prize. Zweilous immediately took on the role of Drakon's bodyguard, pacing around him with one head snarling insults to the enemy Pokémon around them and the other's eyes trained on Giovanni balefully. Lance's other teammates moved fluidly to pin down their foes this time, their positions suddenly swapped as dominance shifted.

"Did you truly believe that this could work?" Lance asked softly. "You want to claim yourself a genius who deserves the key to the world, yet you decide to attempt to infiltrate a place guarded by four of Kanto's Masters with barely any back-up."

Giovanni was practically frothing at the mouth at his attempt to get free; Rhyperior looked murderously at Drakon, who simply moved Giovanni to be facing the enraged Pokémon in an unsubtle threat.

"Kill me, then," Giovanni snarled. "Make me into a martyr, oh great Master and Champion."

"You hide behind your own title and assume that the rest of us do as well," Lance said. "Even before you went mad."

"Mad?" Giovanni cackled; Drakon twisted himself even more firmly around the human in his arms as he felt the strain in the smaller body he held. "I'm not mad. The world may be mad, you and every other human may be mad. I am as sane as they come. I see the future, Master Lance. I know where we are headed: into war, bloodshed, and grief."

"You would revel in such a world." Lance looked at the man in Drakon's arms, a diminishment of his former self. Giovanni had once been suave, capable, admired even by both Trainers and the younger Masters who saw how resolutely he had clung to his station for decades. Now, he was forced into submission by Drakon, made a victim of his own malaise.

"Giovanni, you are officially under arrest by the Kanto branch of the Pokémon League," Lance said. "As Champion, I hereby forego all protocol to sentence you to life within Mount Silver. Your Pokémon will be stripped from you, along with any and all protective gear. You will be provided with only sustenance and a radio so that you can hear of the changing world you so desperately wanted to control."

The man growled, twitching only when Zweilous viciously tore his belt holster from him. Pokéballs scattered on the ground; Giovanni's Pokémon stared at them in a mix of horror and despair, going limp beneath their captors.

Lance tilted his head up. "Coatl, please reach Blue and bring him here. As the official Ground Master, he should know what to do with these displaced Pokémon."

"I'll come back, Champion," Giovanni sneered. "You can't stop me by walling me up in a mountain. You think I worked alone? You'll be proven the fool once my reach finds you again. You are nothing- nothing! I am a _god_!"

Lance walked forward, looking at Giovanni closely. "Drakon, we leave for Mount Silver as soon as we can," he said. "Zweilous, thank you for your help. If you could fetch me any of the other resident Masters, please do so. We will make haste once another Master can keep an eye on the Pokémon and carry out my request. Gabite, to me."

The mountain air smelled crisp as it rushed past Lance. Agatha had quickly arrived with one of her Gengar and immediately began returning Giovanni's Pokémon while waving Lance off with the man himself, saying that she would recruit Bruno to finish the task. Drakon was still clinging to Giovanni, who had long since stopped attempting to escape, though whether that was because he gave up or because they were flying hundreds of feet above the ground was a mystery to Lance. The official Indigo League building wasn't too far from Kanto and Johto's shared maximum security prison, hidden away in Mount Silver. That had partially been on purpose; the mountain range was vast and just hidden enough to discourage any Trainers from seeking either place out. Mount Silver also bore a reputation that protected it from nosy explorers and aspiring Trainers alike.

It was there that the League sequestered any dangerous Pokémon. Many of the Pokémon seized in raids to criminal bases weren't depraved enough to need to be euthanized, nor were they tame enough to be distributed to worthy Trainers. Those Pokémon were brought to Mount Silver to live out as normal a life as one could in the aftermath of such horrors. Native Pokémon had long since fled the mountain, and those released there didn't seem bothered to leave, as the League tended to the mountain as best as they could by providing manmade springs of fresh water and an abundance of berry bushes. The Pokémon had also invariably grown up valuing the absoluteness of power above all else, and the mountain was frequently fought over by its ever increasing number of denizens for the right to claim any and all territory. It was a futile battle, but one that engaged the hardened Pokémon enough to make their new lives rewarding.

Of course, the Pokémon weren't just left there to their own devices. Mount Silver had covertly been co-opted into a high-security prison. Each cell carved into the mountain itself was a small circle of a space with a high, arching ceiling that had a single hole for breathing and rain. A single oran berry bush grew wild, branches reaching desperately towards the limited light. A single hand-operated radio sat in the corner of the room, protected from the elements. The roaming Pokémon that sought to test their strength constantly would make sure that any criminal who managed to escape their confinement would step foot into a gruesome death. There was no room for the weak, and the Pokémon had long since stopped needing a human whose orders to obey.

"Drakon, give the man one last full-powered Thunder Wave before releasing him," Lance said, his voice echoing in the damp air of the newly opened cell. His nose wrinkled; it smelled of mildew and decay, even now, and the pool of water that had collected beneath the skylight was stagnant and stale.

The Dragonite, who had clung onto Giovanni and kept him sedated for the entire ride to Mount Silver, finally let go of him, letting the man fall to the ground as his limbs seized from the electricity coursing through his muscles. Lance returned his Dragonite and stepped out of the cell, where Zweilous stood guard and growled at any passing wild Pokémon that looked towards Lance with cool interest. Lance absently patted one of her heads before releasing Gabite.

"Gabite, Stone Edge and Rock Tomb. Seal this entrance as tightly as you can."

The dragon hissed before turning and jerking a claw upwards. A wall of rock burst from the ground, closing Lance off from the murderous glare that Giovanni was giving him. Lance reached out and tapped the stone. Satisfied with its thickness, he returned Zweilous and Gabite, summoned Drakon again, and returned to the League.

The flight was long enough that Lance knew that Lorelei or Agatha would have had the building cleaned up and somewhat put back together by the time he returned. Bruno would have wrestled Giovanni's Pokémon down; when Blue arrived, they would probably have to examine each Pokémon and see if the new Ground Master could persuade them to be loyal to him instead. If not, they would probably be released to Mount Silver themselves. Lance sighed at the irony; a Pokémon and its Trainer, separated by meters of rock, though they might never know of their proximity to each other.

Drakon heard the sigh and crooned up. Lance could hear the exhaustion in his voice.

"I'm sorry, Drakon," Lance said quietly. "I've pushed you hard enough today. I should have asked Flygon to bring me back."

Drakon harrumphed at the idea that he was too tired to serve his Trainer.

Lance chuckled at this. "If you insist."

When they arrived, the building was abnormally silent. Despite being just past noon, none of the typical League workers were wandering around the halls or working quietly away in the kitchen. Lance had the feeling that someone, probably Agatha, had dismissed them all so that they didn't feel inclined to clean up the mess left behind. He wondered vaguely what rumors would come up about that.

Lance wasn't paying too much attention to where he was walking, so he was rather surprised to look up and realize that he was back at the courtyard. It looked as though someone attempted to clean the area up and given up; the sand from Giovanni's Sandstorm cloak had been swept into the grass, but the burn marks on the ground from Charizard were still there, and there were slashes in the walls and floor from where his Pokémon had wrestled for dominance. There was also a sealed case of Pokéballs against the wall where Bruno must have left them for Blue. His own team was in the courtyard, many simply lying on the ground to rest after the battle. Altaria looked over to Lance and sang out a single, mournful note before resting his head on Haxorus once more.

The evidence of the battle was the final sight that Lance needed before his mind finally comprehended exactly what had happened in the past few hours. He had received a strange package, realized that Giovanni was threatening to break into the League, and battled him to a standstill for long enough to capture him and lock him away. His eyes rested on the scorched rivets in the ground where Wyvern had blasted Giovanni's Dugtrio for threatening Lance. She must have flown off, far away, after that final, defiant attack, following the order that Lance had given her weeks before.

Lance could feel himself choke on something. Drakon patted his shoulder, worried eyes glancing at his Trainer's expression. Lance didn't really feel him. The man collapsed onto his knees, hand pressed on his mouth. Was he going to vomit? Was that all that the knot in his stomach was- nausea and stress? What was the feeling in his chest that threatened to tear through him, now that he was faced with the evidence of what had happened? Some tone echoed in his ears; he could tell that his entire team had sprung up and were running over to him, worried for him, but they appeared to be moving so slowly and by the time they got near him he could no longer see them through a blurriness that formed in his vision. He fought the panic rising in his gorge, squeezing his eyes shut as his ears rang and his emotions finally caught up with his logic, no longer separated by fury and adrenaline. Something wet streamed over his hands; he belatedly realized that he must have been crying. He felt his team members pressing against him on all sides, scaled and feathered bodies clustering to offer him comfort, but he couldn't make a sound, all he could do was crumple further in on himself and continue to silently sob.

Ash was gone.

* * *

 **This last scene has been one that has haunted me since the inception of this idea, as well as the entire next/final chapter! I have literally written this behemoth of a story for the sake of writing three (3) scenes and this is the second of them. I had to fiddle with this one so that it actually sort of made sense, so I hope it's somewhat intelligible.**

 **If I can beat a Pokémon game in a month as a six-year-old, then Ash's Pokémon can easily get to some equivalent of level 45-50 in two years. Even if they go up by half a level a day, they would have gotten there in less than a third of a year. If Ash actively training in the anime (did he even train in the anime that much, let's be real) can get past one (1) round of the Indigo League, then Ash being taught by some of the most experienced Trainers in this Kanto knows at least the basics of how to train his Pokémon. Amber hasn't evolved yet because she likes being how tall she thinks she should be (and the official Pokémon heights are a little absurd, I'm going with my own instinct on how tall different species are).**

 **As I mentioned earlier, the next chapter is the final chapter of _Wild Boy_. I know I mentioned some more plans in the beginning of this chapter; I'll give you the details on that at the end of this story. I'm sure there are many thoughts and comments you all have. Please review with any and all questions that you'd like answered about this world/story and I'll try and answer as many as I can with this last chapter.**


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